The latest, terrible death toll, which the mayor of Derna mentioned on Wednesday on the al-Arabija channel, could again only remain temporary. He expects 18,000 to 20,000 deaths, says Abdulmenam Al-Ghaithi. In this case, the number does not come from counts of bodies found by rescue workers or from missing person reports, which would allow us to say how many people did not survive Sunday’s devastating flood disaster.
They are not yet at an exact body count. There are reports of missing persons – there was talk of 10,000 on Wednesday – but the number is probably underestimated. The situation is too chaotic and the rescue workers in Derna, the city on the Mediterranean that is worst affected, are too overwhelmed.
A dam broke in the mountains above the city. It was constructed in the 1970s and is said to have been dilapidated. When it broke, a tidal wave raced down towards the coast, taking everything with it. Cars, trees, bridges, houses, no, not just houses, entire streets. Drone footage shows entire neighborhoods submerged in meters of mud.
Al-Ghaithi knows which neighborhoods in his city are destroyed, completely destroyed; there are hardly any buildings left there. Based on the population figures, the mayor calculates how many deaths there will be. The eastern Libyan government was talking about 5,300 by Wednesday, 5,300 in Derna alone. So now it could be three times, maybe four times that number.
The clean-up and rescue work is progressing slowly. Many of the affected areas are completely cut off from the outside world; there is no electricity and no cell phone reception. The situation is further complicated by the fact that Libya is de-facto a country divided into East and West. Two rival governments have been fighting each other for years and all international efforts to resolve the conflict have so far been unsuccessful. The political chaos is also having a negative impact on post-flood disaster relief efforts. The British BBC quotes a Libyan journalistwho complains that there was no agreement between the two parts of the country, especially at the beginning.
Hundreds of dead people who could not be identified are said to have been buried in mass graves
It has now been three days since the storm hit Daniel, which had previously raged in Greece, has hit Libya. Many victims were still buried under rubble or had been washed into the sea, said a government minister in the east who had previously visited the disaster region. The hope of finding anyone alive under the rubble is gradually fading. Rescue experts estimate the time a person can go without water to be around 72 hours.
The authorities in the disaster region can hardly keep up with the burials. The Libyan government says hundreds of dead people who could not be identified were buried in mass graves. Videos on social media showed convoys of vehicles carrying away the dead.
The international community is trying to provide rapid assistance to the flood victims. Both the United Nations and the EU have assured this. The federal government also wants to help; a corresponding request for help has been received from Libya. The Federal Agency for Technical Relief supplies tents, camp beds, blankets and power generators.
As the aid organization Doctors Without Borders announced, an emergency team made up of logisticians and medical staff is scheduled to arrive in Derna this Thursday “to determine medical needs.” That was what the organization gave known on platform X. They are also bringing emergency medical equipment to treat the injured and body bags for Libya’s Red Crescent charity.