CONGO: At least 100 people have died due to devastating floods in the Congo, which caused sinkholes to engulf neighborhoods and landslide-hit roads.
Devastating floods hits Congo
On Tuesday, heavy rains destroyed Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, injuring dozens more.
According to Prime Minister Jean-Michel Sama Lukonde, authorities are still looking for additional bodies.
Lukonde stated on Tuesday on state television that his team was assessing the damage. According to the Prime Minister and the primary damage control department.
Three locals told media officials that people were killed, houses were submerged, and roads were destroyed in the 24 affected Kinshasa neighbourhoods, which are home to approximately 12 million people.
According to Alid’or Tshibanda, the mayor of the Ngaliema area, more than three dozen people perished, and the bodies are still being counted. Five members of one family were killed in another part of town, some by electrocution.
Pierrot Mantuela stated, “It is a just calamity.” The 30-year-old man lost his mother, three brothers, and a daughter of nine years. He said it hurt to lose his entire family. He claimed the disaster spared his life because he was at work on Monday night when the rains started.
Pictures shared online showed entire neighborhoods filled with murky water and streets torn apart by sinkholes.
In the Mont-Ngafula district, a large hole that swallowed several vehicles appeared to have divided a significant highway. Raincoat-clad spectators crept to the edge to view the abyss.
Kinshasa, one of Africa’s most significant megacities with a population of approximately 15 million, was once a fishing village on the Congo River.
An inadequately regulated rate of urbanization has made Kinshasa progressively helpless against streak floods. After extreme downpours in the city, floods have become more regular because of environmental change.
In 2019, torrential rain flooded low-lying districts in Kinshasa, causing some buildings and roads to collapse and resulting in the deaths of at least 39 people.
According to a 2020 World Bank paper, in addition to causing damage to infrastructure, flooding in Kinshasa costs households $1.2 million per day due to the widespread disruption of transportation.
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