Brazil is experiencing a particularly deadly rainy season this year. Two days after the heaviest rains recorded in 90 years in Petropolis, Brazil, at least 104 people lost their lives in floods and landslides in Petropolis, the Defense announced on Thursday (February 17th). civil.
“At this stage we have recorded 104 deaths and the firefighters have found 24 survivors”announced the civil defense of this tourist city in southeastern Brazil, 60 km north of Rio.
In the streets of Petropolis, many residents spoke Thursday morning of the missing, whose number officially stands at 35, noted a journalist from Agence France-Presse (AFP). Firefighters worked all night in the stricken city of 300,000 inhabitants, but had to stop for a few hours due to the instability of the ground, waterlogged.
The still provisional toll increased the day before hour by hour, after torrential rains, which transformed the picturesque streets of the center into rivers of mud, flattened houses and overturned dozens of cars.
The “state of calamity” decreed
In less than six hours, some points in Petropolis received up to 260 millimeters of rain, more than was expected for the whole month of February, according to the meteorological agency MetSul. The Governor of the State of Rio de Janeiro, Claudio Castro, spoke during a press conference “the worst rains since 1932”. The municipality decreed the“state of calamity” to deal with the emergency.
Images circulated on social media and in the media, showing houses destroyed by landslides and cars violently carried away by the current. Huge amounts of mud engulfed homes and ripped off tin roofs littered the ground. A heavy flow of muddy water was still flowing from the hills Wednesday morning. Many businesses were completely inundated by the water that rushed down the streets of the historic center of Petropolis.
From Russia, where he is visiting, the Brazilian President, Jair Bolsonaro, wrote on Twitter on Wednesday that he was kept informed of ” the tragedy “ and asked his ministers to bring “immediate aid to victims”. “May God comfort the families of the victims! »he added.
Petropolis, the summer residence of the former imperial court, is a tourist destination, which attracts a large number of visitors. In January 2011, more than nine hundred people died in the mountainous region of Rio due to heavy rains that caused flooding and landslides in a wide area including Petropolis and the neighboring towns of Nova Friburgo, Itaipava and Teresopolis.