At least 20 dead after devastating floods hit Australia's east coast
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Loading... - Jacob Bernard
- 09 Mar 2022
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The death toll from weeklong floods battering Australia's east coast rose to 20 on Tuesday, after the bodies of a man and a woman were discovered in floodwaters in Sydney.
Police said the pair were believed to be a missing mother and son whose car was abandoned in a stormwater canal.
Tens of thousands of Sydney residents have been told to evacuate their homes as severe storms and flash flooding inundated swathes of Australia's largest city Tuesday.
The national weather bureau warned of "a tough 48 hours ahead" for Sydney, with 60,000 people subject to evacuation orders and warnings, and the city's Manly Dam beginning to spill.
Intense rainfall across Sydney flooded bridges and homes, swept away cars and even collapsed the roofs of a shopping center and a supermarket.
In the riverside suburb of Georges Hall vehicles were semi-submerged and police had to rescue people stranded in their cars by rising floodwaters.
A 'watery' Black Summer
State emergency services have been stretched thin as the torrential rain and intense storms continued into a second week – with flood warnings in place Tuesday for the entire 2,000-kilometer (1,250-mile) coastline of New South Wales.
"It's very much the watery equivalent of the 'Black Summer' bushfires," emergency services spokesperson Phil Campbell told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
In the past week the scale of the damage to property and wildlife has been similar to those devastating bushfires, he said, which ravaged Australia's east for months in late 2019 and early 2020. Read More…
