Brazil mounts frantic rescue effort as flooding kills 75

PORTO ALEGRE/CANOAS: Authorities in southern Brazil raced against the clock on Sunday to rescue people from raging floods and mudslides that have killed at least 75 and forced more than 80,000 to flee their homes.

Across Porto Alegre, the capital city of Rio Grande do Sul state, people stood on rooftops hoping to be rescued, while others in canoes or small boats navigated streets that had turned into rivers.

Civil defence officials said at least 101 people were missing in the latest in a string of catastrophic weather events in the South American giant.

Viewed from the air, Porto Alegre was completely flooded, with streets under water and the roofs of some houses barely visible.

According to the local municipality, the Guaiba River, which flows through the city of 1.4 million people, reached a record high level of 5.3 metres, well above the historic peak of 4.76 metres that had stood as a record since the devastating 1941 floods.

Water was still advancing into economically important Porto Alegre and hundreds of other localities, with increasingly dramatic consequences. Rain was intermittent on Sunday morning, but was expected to continue for another day at least as floodwaters kept rising.

In addition to the tens of thousands forced from their homes, Brazil’s civil defence agency said more than a million people lacked access to drinking water and it described the damage as incalculable. Some 15,000 people are now living in shelters.

Rosana Custodio, a 37-year-old nurse, fled her flooded Porto Alegre home with her husband and three children.

“During the night on Thursday the waters began to rise very quickly,” she said via a WhatsApp message. “In a hurry, we went out to look for a safer place. But we couldn’t walk … My husband put our two little ones in a kayak and rowed with a bamboo. My son and I swam to the end of the street,” she said. Her family was safe but “we’ve lost everything we had.”

Authorities scrambled to evacuate swamped neighbourhoods as rescue workers used four-wheel-drive vehicles — and even jet skis — to manoeuvre through waist-deep water in search of the stranded.

Rio Grande do Sul Governor Eduardo Leite said his state, normally one of Brazil’s most prosperous, would need a “Marshall Plan” of heavy investment to rebuild.

Sunday will be a key day for the rescue effort, said Paulo Pimenta, a senior communications official under President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.