Authorities warned residents to remain at home yesterday after heavy rains began falling again across Mumbai and the surrounding state, which were hammered last week by devastating floods.
Cleanup efforts and the distribution of food supplies to needy residents were badly slowed by the renewed monsoon rains, which began early yesterday morning, and aviation officials ordered the city's airports, the busiest in the country, closed because of poor visibility. The airports reopened at around noon after a seven-hour shutdown.
Officials, meanwhile, said the death toll from the recent rains could reach 1,000.
The recovery over the weekend of more than 100 bodies pushed the official death toll to 899. Yesterday, officials said more bodies were likely to be recovered from the flood-devastated Raigad district.
"The bodies are still coming out. There will be another 100 or so," said K. Vatsa, state rehabilitation secretary. "The toll will definitely be around 1,000."
With renewed rains pounding the city, the Mumbai police issued an alert cautioning people to stay home because of rising water levels.
"We're asking people to travel only if essential," said Mumbai's police chief A.N. Roy.
Five days after crippling rains pounded western India -- reaching a record 94cm in suburban Mumbai -- soldiers, civil defense teams and aid workers continued to find bodies from the state's worst-affected districts: Raigad, Ratnagiri, Thane, Parbhani, Nanded and Kolhapur.
But incessant rainfall and mounds of debris, boulders and mud tangled into the wooden and tin remains of people's homes were making it a challenge to pull out the remaining bodies.
"The rains are making retrieval difficult," Vatsa said.
Nearly 200 medical teams from Mumbai have set out for more than 300 villages across the state. Civic authorities have deployed health workers in the Mumbai suburbs to distribute medicines and disinfectants to guard against the spread of waterborne diseases.
As many as 418 people were killed in Mumbai -- most of them drowned, buried by landslides or electrocuted.
Government and relief officials say there is little likelihood of finding more survivors.
Yesterday, electricity was gradually restored to many northern Mumbai neighborhoods a day after angry demonstrators blocked traffic demanding restoration of clean drinking water, power and the cleanup of garbage and decomposing animal carcasses.
Residents in five Mumbai neighborhoods shouted anti-government slogans and demanded an immediate cleanup. Some shielded themselves from the rain with plastic sheets, while others simply got drenched as they demonstrated outside civic offices.
"For so many days we have been lifting the bodies of the dead and now we are clearing animals from the roads. Is this our work?" asked a furious Hafeez Irani, his face covered with a handkerchief against the stench.
NEXT GENERATION: The four plants in the Central Taiwan Science Park, designated Fab 25, would consist of four 1.4-nanometer wafer manufacturing plants, TSMC said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) plans to begin construction of four new plants later this year, with the aim to officially launch production of 2-nanometer semiconductor wafers by late 2028, Central Taiwan Science Park Bureau director-general Hsu Maw-shin (許茂新) said. Hsu made the announcement at an event on Friday evening celebrating the Central Taiwan Science Park’s 22nd anniversary. The second phase of the park’s expansion would commence with the initial construction of water detention ponds and other structures aimed at soil and water conservation, Hsu said. TSMC has officially leased the land, with the Central Taiwan Science Park having handed over the
The Philippines is working behind the scenes to enhance its defensive cooperation with Taiwan, the Washington Post said in a report published on Monday. “It would be hiding from the obvious to say that Taiwan’s security will not affect us,” Philippine Secretary of National Defense Gilbert Teodoro Jr told the paper in an interview on Thursday last week. Although there has been no formal change to the Philippines’ diplomatic stance on recognizing Taiwan, Manila is increasingly concerned about Chinese encroachment in the South China Sea, the report said. The number of Chinese vessels in the seas around the Philippines, as well as Chinese
AUKUS: The Australian Ambassador to the US said his country is working with the Pentagon and he is confident that submarine issues will be resolved Australian Ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd on Friday said that if Taiwan were to fall to China’s occupation, it would unleash China’s military capacities and capabilities more broadly. He also said his country is working with the Pentagon on the US Department of Defense’s review of the AUKUS submarine project and is confident that all issues raised will be resolved. Rudd, who served as Australian prime minister from 2007 to 2010 and for three months in 2013, made the remarks at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado and stressed the longstanding US-Australia alliance and his close relationship with the US Undersecretary
‘WORLD WAR III’: Republican Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene said the aid would inflame tensions, but her amendment was rejected 421 votes against six The US House of Representatives on Friday passed the Department of Defense Appropriations Act for fiscal 2026, which includes US$500 million for Taiwan. The bill, which totals US$831.5 billion in discretionary spending, passed in a 221-209 vote. According to the bill, the funds for Taiwan would be administered by the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency and would remain available through Sept. 30, 2027, for the Taiwan Security Cooperation Initiative. The legislation authorizes the US Secretary of Defense, with the agreement of the US Secretary of State, to use the funds to assist Taiwan in procuring defense articles and services, and military training. Republican Representative
RSS