Flood
Tidal wave in Russia is still rising
Local residents ride in their rubber boat to help evacuate people in Orenburg. photo
© Uncredited/AP/dpa
The Russian border area with Kazakhstan is suffering from the worst flooding since records began. The authorities expect that even more houses will be under water.
Authorities expect the devastating floods in Russia’s Orenburg region to peak on Friday and Saturday. It is expected that another 800 houses will be flooded, said Deputy Governor Sergei Balykin, according to the state news agency Tass. This affects another 2,300 people. Because of the According to reports, around 12,000 residential buildings and 15,000 garden plots in the Orenburg region are flooded.
In the regional capital Orenburg, which has half a million inhabitants, a water level of 11.1 meters was measured on the Ural River on Friday morning – almost two meters above the critical mark of 9.3 meters. Experts expected the flood to rise to 11.6 meters. The previous recorded high was 9.4 meters in 1942, Orenburg Governor Denis Pasler said during a video link with President Vladimir Putin on Thursday evening.
There are also severe floods in the other Russian regions on the border with Kazakhstan and in Kazakhstan itself. The trigger is snowmelt, exacerbated by rainfall. According to media reports, the region’s residents complain about the authorities’ poor crisis management. Putin only listened to the reports from the regional governors. He ordered everything to be prepared for reconstruction after the water had drained away. This emerges from the official Kremlin transcript of the meeting.