Important Takeaways:
- Nearly 100 dead and missing in Mexico from hurricane -state governor
- The number of people dead and missing due to Hurricane Otis, a Category 5 storm which hammered the Mexican Pacific resort city of Acapulco last week, has risen to close to 100, authorities in the state of Guerrero said on Monday.
- Otis battered Acapulco with winds of 165 miles per hour (266 km per hour) on Wednesday, flooding the city, tearing roofs from homes, hotels and other businesses, submerging vehicles, and severing communications as well as road and air connections.
- Evelyn Salgado, governor of Acapulco’s home state of Guerrero, said 45 people were confirmed dead and 47 others were missing, citing figures from state prosecutors. Salgado had said on Sunday morning the death toll stood at 43.
- On Sunday afternoon, Mexico’s federal civil protection authorities said there were 48 dead, consisting of 43 in Acapulco and five in nearby Coyuca de Benitez.
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Important Takeaways:
- Lewiston, Maine mass shooting suspect Robert Card wanted on murder charges, with 18 dead
- Maine State Police Col. William Ross said Thursday an arrest warrant for fugitive Robert Card has been issued on at least eight counts of murder as the victims are still being identified from a series of mass shootings in Lewiston, Maine, Wednesday night.
- He said eight people were killed at Schemengees Bar and Grill while seven were killed at the Just-In-Time Recreation bowling alley, while another three died after being transported to local hospitals.
- A massive manhunt is underway to find 40-year-old Card of Bowdoin, who has been identified by authorities as the suspect.
- Maine Gov. Janet Mills said there were 18 people dead in the shootings and 13 injured.
- “In memory of those we lost and in honor of those who were injured, President Biden and I have ordered all U.S. flags and state of Maine flags to be lowered to half-staff immediately for the next five days,” she said.
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Important Takeaways:
- Hurricane Otis caused 27 confirmed deaths and left 4 missing, Mexican authorities report
- Mexican authorities gave the first human toll for Hurricane Otis’ destruction along the country’s Pacific coast Thursday: at least 27 dead and four missing.
- Tens of thousands of residents in damaged homes without electricity awaited help more than a day after Otis roared ashore in Acapulco.
- López Obrador said the destruction was so complete that not a single power line pole remained standing in the impact zone. Small farmers had their corn crops devastated by Otis’ wind and pounding rain, he said. Restoring power to the area was a top priority, he said.
- The early images and accounts were of extensive devastation, toppled trees and power lines lying in brown floodwaters that in some areas extended for miles. The resulting destruction delayed a comprehensive response by the government, which was still assessing the damage along the coast, and made residents desperate.
- Many of the once sleek beachfront hotels in Acapulco looked like toothless, shattered hulks after the Category 5 storm blew out hundreds — and possibly thousands — of windows
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Important Takeaways:
- Afghanistan earthquake has killed more than 2,000, Taliban say
- “More than 2,060 people are dead and over 10,000 are injured,” he told the Guardian. “Many more people are still under the rubble.”
- Saturday’s magnitude-6.3 quake – followed by eight strong aftershocks – jolted hard-to-reach areas 19 miles (30km) from the provincial capital of Herat, toppling rural homes and sending panicked city dwellers into the streets.
- “Twelve villages in Zindah Jan and six in Ghoryan district are completely reduced to rubble. We expect the death toll will rise and efforts are under way to take people out,” the official added. “Rescue teams from Helmand and Kandahar have arrived in Herat.
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Important Takeaways:
- As Storm Daniel pounded the area with torrential rains, dams above the Wadi Derna river valley collapsed, sweeping away entire neighborhoods and the families who lived in them.
- The floods have left thousands dead, missing and displaced.
- 16,000 children are among the displaced and warned that many more lack access to basic services such as health and schooling.
- International and local search and rescue teams and survivors continued the work of recovery
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Important Takeaways:
- Health authorities have been sounding the alarm over the spread of waterborne diseases in the affected areas, particularly in the hard-hit city of Derna.
- Experts have warned that floodwaters have severely contaminated water sources with sewage, rendering them unsafe for consumption and exposing communities to grave health risks.
- The response has ranged from evacuating stranded residents and providing medical aid and essential supplies to securing safe water and sanitation equipment in order to prevent diseases from taking hold.
- Aid groups are also calling people to avoid rushing towards mass burials or carrying out mass cremations
- In a joint statement, the WHO and the ICRC said the bodies of victims of natural disaster “almost never” pose a health danger but also warned that “bodies should not be left in contact with drinking water sources” as they may leak feces that could lead to contamination.
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Important Takeaways:
- The number of people killed by the devastating flash flooding in northern Libya remained unclear Thursday, due to the daunting scale of the catastrophe…but it was undoubtedly well into the thousands.
- An enormous surge of water, brought by torrential downpours from Storm Daniel over the weekend, burst two upstream river dams and reduced the city of Derna to an apocalyptic wasteland where entire blocks and untold numbers of people were washed into the Mediterranean Sea.
- Hundreds of body bags lined its mud-caked streets Thursday, awaiting mass burials, as traumatized and grieving residents search mangled buildings for the missing and bulldozers worked to clear streets.
- More than 3,000 bodies had been buried in Derna alone, while another 2,000 were still being processed. He said most of the dead were buried in mass graves outside the city, while others were transferred to nearby towns and cities.
- An official with the U.N.’s World Health Organization in Libya told the AP the number of fatalities could reach 7,000, given how many people were still missing, adding that “the numbers could surprise and shock all of us.”
- Speaking to the Al Arabia television network, Derna’s Mayor Abdel-Raham al-Ghaithi said the final death toll could even be as high as 20,000.
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Important Takeaways:
- Storm Daniel has wreaked havoc across Libya with 2,000 people feared dead as the devastating floods have broken dams and swept away neighborhoods.
- Worst hit was the city of Derna in eastern Libya, which had become inaccessible, and many of the thousands missing there were believed carried away by waters after two upstream dams burst.
- Ahmed al-Mosmari, a spokesman for the country’s armed forces based in the east, told a news conference that the death toll in Derna had surpassed 2,000. He said there were between 5,000 and 6,000 reported missing.
- Al-Mosmari attributed the catastrophe to the collapse of two nearby dams, causing a lethal flash flood.
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Important Takeaways:
- Morocco earthquake: at least 2,000 dead and thousands more injured
- A powerful earthquake in Morocco’s High Atlas Mountains has killed at least 2,000 people, a death toll that is expected to rise as rescuers were struggling on Saturday to reach hard-hit remote areas.
- The magnitude-6.8 quake is the biggest to hit the North African country in 120 years.
- At least 2,012 people died in the quake, mostly in Marrakech and five provinces near the epicenter, Morocco’s interior ministry said. At least another 2,059 people were injured, 1,404 critically, officials said.
- The full toll will almost certainly increase as rescuers have struggled to bypass boulder-strewn roads to the remote mountain villages that were hit hardest.
- The World Health Organization (WHO) said more than 300,000 people had been affected by the powerful tremors throughout the country.
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Important Takeaways:
- As many as 200 people may have been living in the building, witnesses said
- A nighttime fire ripped through a rundown five-story building in Johannesburg that was occupied by homeless people and squatters, leaving at least 73 people dead early Thursday, emergency services in South Africa’s biggest city said.
- A witness said he saw people throwing babies out of the burning building in an attempt to save them and that at least one man died when he jumped from a window on the third floor and hit the concrete sidewalk “head first.”
- Seven of the victims were children, the youngest a 1-year-old, according to an emergency services spokesperson.
- Mulaudzi, the emergency services spokesperson, said the death toll was likely to increase and more bodies were probably trapped inside the building.
- The fire took three hours to contain, he said, and firefighters needed time to work through all five floors.
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