Floods affect 17 dists, disrupt road connections

Rivers spilled over their banks across 14 districts in Bangladesh until Tuesday, with floodwaters gradually overtaking swathes of 17 northern and central districts, over a quarter of the country.

Besides sweeping away four children, hundreds of houses, embankments, the flowing rivers also engulfed roads, cutting off road communications of unions and upazilas with their headquarters.

Banana rafts remain the major means of communication for most of the 14.56 lakh flood victims while few available government engine boats are not strong enough to reach many flooded areas, especially in chars.

As the River Padma swelled throughout Tuesday, its strong current hampered ferry services across the river via Shimulia-Kathalbari and Daulatdia-Paturia river crossings, creating traffic jam on either sides of the river at the two ferry terminals.

The two river crossings are the connecting point between the capital and 40 south-western districts.

‘The Padma is turning ever more ferocious by the hour and it may cause further disruption in ferry services,’ said BIWTA manager at Shimulia ferry terminal Ahmed Ali.

The river is flowing at a speed of up to 13km per hour but ferries, far above what the ferries that travel across the river are capable of handling as they ply 8km per hour, he said.

Over 600 vehicles were stranded on Shimulia side of the river crossing until Tuesday afternoon as the travel time to cross the river got doubled or even more, reported New Age correspondent in Munshiganj.

Two bulkheads capsized near the under-construction Padma Bridge in Munshiganj around 11:00am but its crews were rescued.

New Age correspondent in Manikganj reported that over 400 vehicles got stranded on both sides of the Paturia-Daulatdia ghat as ferry service was hampered for the last two days.

The Padma was flowing nearly seven centimetres above the danger level at Bhagyakul, Munshiganj and is likely to keep flowing above the danger level over the next week.

New Age correspondent in Lalmonirhat reported that the Teesta and Dharla swept away four children in Kurigram, Gaibandha and Rangpur, taking the total death tally related to flood to 33.

Jyoti Prashad Ghosh, north zone chief of the Water Development Board, said that 1,352 houses were eroded in Rangpur division between Monday and Tuesday.

All the 653 chars, occupying 42 per cent of Rangpur division, remained stranded and almost completely out of any communications as government did not have the means to reach them.

The government offices in Rangpur division have only 54 small engine boats to reach the chars distributed among 67 unions in the eight districts of Rangpur division.

‘We have not even received a grain of relief in two weeks,’ said Mofazzal Hossain, chairman of Rajpur union parishad, Lalmonirhat.

Most of the unions of Fulbari, Chilmari and Roumari upazilas in Kurigram remained out of reach by road.

In Gaibandha’s Sundarganj, three of its eight unions are completely under water, with all their roads damaged and eroded.

 

Three unions of Ranpur’s Pirgachha are out of reach as well as road communications have collapsed.

In Nilphamari, four of the right unions of Dimla upazila could not be reached without boats.

‘All our roads are under water here and badly damaged,’ said Amzad Hossain, chairman, Char Kharibari, Dimla.

The disaster management and relief state minister Enamur Rahman on Tuesday said that 14.56 lakh people have been affected by floods so far as he predicted it to get worse further over the next three days.

He said that 2.84 lakh families are stranded in 464 unions in 17 districts and promised to get them relief materials they need.

‘About 20,000 people have taken refuge at 1,035 government shelters in 12 districts,’ he said, adding that the government would take care of their daily meals from Wednesday.

The minister held the press conference a day after the Teesta broke all records in terms of discharge of water while the Flood Forecasting and Warning Centre warned that the flood situation would deteriorate over the next seven days.

New Age correspondent in Feni reported that the River Muhuri experienced a fall in water level overnight and was flowing below the danger level, but water continued to enter through the 11 breaches opened in embankments in Parshuram and Fulgazi.

Fresh villages went under water in the upazilas between Monday and Tuesday in Feni.

Many fish and poultry farms were washed away while seedbeds were damaged by the floods since Monday in the upazilas.

The FFWC predicted that the flood situation in north-eastern districts may improve over the next two days.

The north-eastern districts were swept by two spells of flood already with many of its roads damaged in the first spell.

The Roads and Highways Department estimated that 35km of roads got damaged in the first flood spell which would require Tk 54.55 crore to get repaired.

Bangladesh Meteorological Department predicted light to moderate rains at many places over Rangpur, Mymensingj, Sylhet, Khulna, Barishal and Chattogram divisions and at places at Rajshahi and Dhaka divisions.

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net