Brazil floods kill 39, leave 1,000 missing

FLOODS after days of driving rain have killed at least 39 people in northeastern Brazil, and left 1,000 unaccounted for and another 100,000 people homeless, authorities said.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has called a crisis cabinet meeting and said the government would make federal funds available to help the homeless.

“Up until the early afternoon we had 26 confirmed dead in Alagoas (state) and more than 1,000 people missing,” Alagoas Governor Teotonio Vilela Filho said, quoted on the official Agencia Brasil news agency.

“We are praying for the missing to be found alive. But we are very worried because bodies are starting to turn up on beaches and on riverbanks,” Vilela told reporters at a press briefing before meeting with Lula.

Civil defence officials in devastated Alagoas state said the Mundau River burst its banks in the town of Uniao dos Palmares, leaving at least 500 people unaccounted for there.

The torrents swept away more than 40,000 houses, entire bridges and streets, as well as rail lines in 22 towns across Alagoas, Vilela said.

Firefighters told AFP there were entire towns on the banks of the Mundau in Alagoas that were “wiped off the map”, while others were severely damaged or left cut off by floodwaters.

Meanwhile, torrential rains burst a dike in southern China, sending 68,000 people fleeing their homes and prompting China’s top leaders to call yesterday for stepped-up rescue operations for the thousands still in danger.

Floodwaters breached the Changkai levee on the Fu River in Jiangxi province late on Monday, forcing residents to relocate from their homes in the nearby city of Fuzhou, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.