Thousands marooned in floods in Bangladesh

Tens of thousands of people in different parts of Bangladesh including Lalmonirhat, Sunamganj and Bandarban have been marooned by floods caused by heavy rains and water-flow coming from upstream India in the last couple of days.

On Thursday, much of Lalmonirhat and a half of Sunamganj were inundated by rapidly swelling rivers.

Fresh areas are likely to be submerged due to heavy rains inside Bangladesh as well as across the borders.

Heavy rains occurred for the sixth day in a row inside Bangladesh as well as in India in the upstream until Friday.

Weathermen predicted that rains would fall throughout July.

Due to massive onrush of water from the upstream India, the border rivers overflowed and breached embankments inundating several areas in Lalmonirhat, Sunamganj and Bandarban.

Small landslides occurred in the hilly regions in Chattogram division but no casualties were reported.

People in the port city of Chattogram had no respite from water-logging.

At least 35,000 families were marooned in Lalmonirhat as flood waters engulfed much of all the five upazilas in the northern district with the Teesta flowing 20 cm above its danger mark and Dharla –13 cm above its danger level, reports the New Age.

Both the rivers breached their embankments at many places rapidly inundating fresh areas.

The Teesta Barrage authorities opened all the sluice gates as the pressure of waters mounted after India opened the sluice gates of Gajoldoba Barrage.

At least five schools in Char Razpur union in Lalmonirhat Sadar and Goddimari union in Hatibandha were shut down.

Dozens of other villages in Lalmonirhat were at the risk of being flooded any moment.

According to New Age correspondent in Sylhet, six out of 11 upazilas in Sunamganj had been submerged by flood waters.

Sunamganj sadar, Bhishwambharpur, Tahirpur, Jamalganj, Dharmapasha and Doarabazar are the flooded upazilas in the district.

Tahirpur and Doarabazar have been cut off from the Sunamganj district town.

Sunamganj district education office said that 10 schools were closed down and the campuses of at least 100 schools had been submerged by flash floods.

The Flood Forecasting and Warning Centre (FFWC) in its afternoon update said that Teesta, Surma, Kushiyara, Sarigowain, Someswari, Kangsha, Halda, Sangu and Matamuhuri were flowing above their danger levels at least at 13 points.

All the major rivers will continue to rise until Sunday, the FFWC said.

The FFWC predicted that many areas in Netrokona, Sunamganj, Sylhet, Chattogram and Cox’s Bazar would go under flood waters over the next 24 hours.

In next 48 hours, the FFWC said, the Jamuna River would be flowing above the danger level at Bahadurabad .

The FFWC recorded above 100 mm of rains in eight of its monitoring stations in 24 hours ending at 9AM Thursday. It recorded country’s highest rainfall of 182 mm at Moheshkhola.

The Met Office recorded country’s highest rainfall of 216 mm in 24 hours till 6 PM at Sitakunda. It rained 202 mm in Kutubdia during the same time.

The Met Office predicted heavy to very heavy rains across seven of the eight divisions in the country except for Khulna in 24 hours ending at 6 PM Friday.

The FFWC said Cherapunji received 370 mm of rains in 24 hours ending at 9AM Thursday.

New Age correspondent in Chattogram said that many houses were damaged by landslide at Pora Colony, Lalkhan Bazar Thursday morning.

The colony’s inhabitants were evacuated to a government shelter.

About 700 others were evacuated to eight shelter centres opened in Chattogram since July 6.

On Thursday, parts of Agrabad CDA, Badurtola, Prabartak Intersection, Alongkar, Pahartoli, Bakalia, Chawkbazar, Mehedibag, Tin Poler Matha, Jamal Khan, Oxygen, Wireless, Guljar, DC Road, New Market, Amtola, Kadamtoli, Saltgola, Sadargaht, and WASA Intersection have been water logged.

Heavy rains also slowed down loading and unloading at Chattogram Port.

Kamruzzaman