Floods triggered by heavy rains and a river bursting its banks have killed at least 50 people and left thousands more homeless in southwestern Congo, a provincial governor said Thursday. Torrential rains caused the Kalamu river, which flows through the city of Boma into the River Congo, to overflow for two hours before the waters receded, washing some of the victims across the border into Angola.
The waters left parts of the city, Democratic Republic of Congo's sole Atlantic port, covered in up to a metre of mud and a search was under way to dig out more bodies that may be buried. "The rains on the night of Monday to Tuesday in Boma have caused at least 50 deaths," Jacques Mbadu, governor of Kongo Central province told AFP.
"We buried 31 bodies on Wednesday and we expect to get about 20 more bodies back today that ended up across the border in Angola," Mbadu added. Mbadu said the waters hit a peak of two metres (six feet) above their usual level, destroying at least 500 homes and leaving several thousand people homeless.