Residents of Rio Grande do Sul, in southern Brazil, are holding their breath. While many people, not yet rescued, have found shelter on the roofs of their homes to escape the floods, further rains are expected in this state. The cyclone that hit the region earlier this week killed at least 31 people, according to the latest report from local authorities on Wednesday, September 6.
“The water rose very quickly, I didn’t have time to save anything, I lost everything,” local resident Paulo Roberto Neto Vargas told Agence France-Presse (AFP). 39 years from Roca Sales, where six bodies were found by firefighters. “I heard screams, cries for help (…), my neighbor had water up to his neck,” he continues.
The exceptional rainfall and strong winds of recent days have caused enormous damage and many localities have been literally submerged by the floods. Dozens of firefighters and police are mobilized for rescue operations in extremely delicate conditions, to access certain totally isolated areas.
“Unfortunately, I have received confirmation of four new deaths,” Rio Grande do Sul state governor Eduardo Leite said at a midday press briefing. The death toll rose to 21 on Tuesday evening, then to 27 on Wednesday morning.
“Given the situation, this toll could increase further,” said the governor, for whom the region is experiencing “the worst climatic event in its history”.
Race against time
More than 52,000 people from 70 municipalities in the state of Rio Grande do Sul have been affected since Monday by torrential rains, which caused flooding and landslides. More than 5,000 residents had to leave their homes.
In some localities, the water level has risen so much that “a large number of people are still sheltering on the roofs of their houses”, revealed the governor. Rescuers are now engaged in a race against time to rescue them, by boat or helicopter. “We are concerned as further rainfall is expected late today and tomorrow. The soils are soggy and the river beds are already full,” warned Eduardo Leite.
In the morning, two ministers from the government of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva flew over the disaster areas. “What we have seen is sad and distressing”, wrote on X (ex-Twitter) the Minister of Communication, Paulo Pimenta. “As long as it is not possible to accurately measure the material damage, all our efforts are to try to save lives. Many people are isolated in at-risk areas,” he added.
The city that has suffered the highest number of deaths to date is Muçum, a small town of 5,000 inhabitants where 15 bodies were found on Tuesday, and 85% of whose territory was covered by the flooding of the Taquari River.
Climatic events through uncontrolled urbanization
Brazil has been hit by deadly bad weather in recent years, and experts see links to climate change. “In Brazil, the cyclones did not reach much to the continent, as is more often the case in the northern hemisphere, but it is becoming more and more frequent”, explains to AFP Francis Lacerda, researcher of the Laboratory. of climate change from the Institute of Agronomy of Pernambuco. “These are extreme phenomena because the amount of energy that is released is exacerbated by the greenhouse effect,” she says.
In June, a cyclone killed 16 people in the same region. In February, floods and landslides caused by torrential rains in the state of Sao Paulo (southeast) killed at least 65 people.
In Brazil, the devastating effect of these climatic phenomena is compounded by uncontrolled urbanization, with many people living in precarious hillside housing. About 9.5 million of the 203 million people in Latin America’s largest country live in areas at risk of flooding or landslides.