The death toll from the floods caused by a river overflowing in the Santa Cruz region, the most populous in Bolivia located in the east of the country, has risen to seven, and there are at least 20 people missing, the government of Rodrigo Paz confirmed this Sunday.
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“Unfortunately, there are more than 20 people missing and seven officially reported dead,” Deputy Minister of Civil Defense Alfredo Troche told the media, after flying over the municipality of El Torno, the most affected so far by the overflow of the Piraí River that occurred on Saturday morning.
Troche declared himself “very dismayed” by the state of the affected communities, where the “situation is regrettable” and “critical,” and reported that resources are being sought to intensify rescue and assistance efforts for the victims.
The deputy minister explained that they are currently working with three helicopters whose job is to bring food to the communities that are still isolated by water and mud and to evacuate people, although the capacity of these aircraft is limited.
El viceministro de Defensa Civil, Alfredo Troche, informó que la crecida del río Piraí en El Torno y otras localidades dejó hasta el momento 7 fallecidos, unos 20 desaparecidos y más de 600 familias afectadas. Las Fuerzas Armadas realizan operativos por tierra, aire y agua.
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A shelter has been set up in the municipal coliseum of El Torno to house the families affected by the floods, where humanitarian aid donations are being concentrated and medical care is also being provided.
One of the places that was isolated is the Center for Guidance and Social Reintegration (Cenvicruz) for adolescents, from where 32 were evacuated by air yesterday. Today, efforts are underway to remove more than a hundred who remain there, explained the governor of Santa Cruz, Luis Fernando Camacho.
Camacho, who arrived in El Torno today, assured that the priority today is to finish evacuating the minors from Cenvicruz, for whom a special shelter has been set up in a school next to the coliseum that houses the rest of the population.
According to the governor, eleven communities have suffered material and human losses, and the damage from the destruction of bridges in this municipality alone amounts to 250 million bolivianos (about 35.9 million dollars).
The government plans to declare a “departmental disaster” in the coming hours to coordinate more directly with the national government and “receive even more aid,” he added.
The Paz government installed a ‘Crisis and Situation Room’ in the Government House in La Paz, which, as authorities anticipated yesterday, functions “as a strategic center for leadership, control, and decision-making.”
This body will maintain “direct and real-time coordination” with the Incident Command Center (CCI) that was installed in El Torno and with the Departmental Emergency Operations Committee (COED) of Santa Cruz to ensure “an organized, efficient response without duplication of efforts.”
The River Piraí Channeling and Regulation Service (Searpi) reported yesterday that the rains that fell in the area caused historic increases in that and other tributaries in Santa Cruz, with consequent overflows, which this morning also reached the municipality of Porongo, in the same region.
From teleSUR English via This RSS Feed.