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07-04-2024
ORSK: Thousands of people are being evacuated in the Russian Urals after a section of the embankment dam burst in the mountain city of Orsk, officials say.
Heavy earth-moving machinery is on site trying to shore up the dam.
Earlier, an emergency was declared across the entire Orenburg region after levels in the Ural River rose dangerously because of melting ice.
Officials say 10,000 residents may be in the flooding zone and up to 4,000 houses could be inundated.
“Work in the area of the dam rupture in Orsk continues,” the Russian Emergencies Ministry said in a statement, adding that around 440 people and 217 pieces of equipment were involved in the effort.
Russian state media said residents of two of the three districts of Orsk were being evacuated.
“Citizens of the Leninsky and Sovetsky districts of Orsk are being evacuated to temporary accommodation centres,” the regional prosecutor’s office said in a message.
Local emergency services said they were working to stem the flooding in Orsk, about 1,800km (1,100 miles) east of Moscow.
Orsk has a population of about 230,000. The evacuees are being moved to nearby schools.
Unverified footage on the Telegram messenger app appeared to show water gushing through a breach in an earthen dam.
The region which includes Orsk, other Urals provinces and parts of neighboring Kazakhstan has been hit by widespread flooding in recent days.
Local authorities in Russia’s Ural Mountains Orenburg region urged residents of riverside communities to evacuate on Friday, as rising waters in the Ural River flooded villages, and caused a dam to burst.
In a video message posted on the Telegram messenger app, Orenburg Mayor Sergei Salmin said the situation was “critical”, and that residents of riverside settlements should evacuate immediately.
“Don’t wait for the situation to become threatening! Leave! You need to evacuate as quickly as possible,” said Salmin, whose city is located 1,500 km (930 miles) east of Moscow, close to Russia’s border with Kazakhstan.
He said that 300 houses had already been flooded.
A string of Russian Siberian and Urals mountain provinces, including Orenburg region and neighboring parts of Kazakhstan have been grappling with floods in recent days.
A state of emergency has been declared in the Orenburg region, the country’s emergencies ministry said, and ministry personnel had helped 3,500 people affected by flooding nationwide in recent days. (Int’l Monitoring Desk)
