Srinagar, India
Reuters
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At least 46 people have been killed and more than 200 have been missing after a sudden heavy rain in Kashmir, India, officials said Thursday that the second disaster in the Himalayas was just over a week.
The incident occurred in the town of Kishtwal, Chasoti, a stopover point for a popular pilgrimage route. A little over a week comes after heavy floods and landslides have engulfed the entire village of Uttarakhand, the Himalayas.
The floods have washed away security posts installed in the community’s kitchens and villages. Pit stop along the pilgrimage route to Masirmata Temple refused to be named because he was not allowed to speak to the media about the incident.
“A large number of pilgrims gathered for lunch and they were washed away,” officials said.
Machail Yatra is a popular pilgrimage to pilgrims from Chasoti to temples from one of the symptoms of Goddess Durga, and the highland Himalaya shrines at Masirmata, and the vehicle path ends.
“The news is harsh, accurate and accurate, and verified information from the areas where cloudburst hits have been coming late,” Omar Abdullah, prime minister of the federal territories of India’s Jammu and Kashmir, said in a post in X.
TV footage showed pilgrims crying in fear as the water flooded the village.
The disaster occurred at 11:30am local time, Kishtwar district department director Ramesh Kumar told news agency ANI, adding that local police and disaster response officials had reached the scene.
“The Army and Air Force teams are also being revitalized. Search and rescue operations are ongoing,” Kumar said.
According to the Indian weather sector, cloudbursts are sudden, heavy downpours of rain over 100 mm (4 inches) in just an hour, which can cause sudden flooding, landslides and devastation, especially in mountainous regions during the monsoon.
The local weather office in Srinagar predicted severe showers in several areas of Kashmir on Thursday, asking residents to stay away from loose structures, utility poles and old trees due to the possibility of landslides and flash floods, including Kishtwar.
