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Storm fury: India battered, US braces
(China Daily)
Updated: 2005-09-22 06:21
HYDERABAD, India: Heavy downpours killed at least 54 people, and thousands of others were evacuated as swollen rivers flooded their banks in southwestern India, officials said yesterday.
Walkers on the beachfront of Florida's Key West feel the force of the advancing Hurricane Rita on Tuesday. [AFP] |
In Bangladesh nearly 3,500 fishermen were reported missing.
The coastal districts of India's Andhra Pradesh state were battered by torrential rains following a tropical cyclone that hit the area two days earlier.
Railroad tracks and major highways connecting cities along the coast were flooded as the state's two main rivers breached embankments on Tuesday, Shashank Goel, an official in charge of disaster management, said in Hyderabad, the capital of Andhra Pradesh.
More than 35,000 residents of low-lying villages have been evacuated to relief camps set up in government buildings and schools located on higher ground, Goel said.
Officials said at least 48 people were killed by the strong rains and winds, which flattened homes, knocked down power lines and uprooted trees. Six people were killed when their homes in the coastal districts collapsed on Tuesday.
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