Death Toll Rises to 87 as Rain Triggers Floods and Landslides in Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
The death toll from rain-triggered floods and landslides in Pakistan's northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province has risen to 87. According to the Associated Press on October 18, heavy rain at the tail of the monsoon season began battering the province's mountainous districts on October 16, unleashing flash floods and landslides in Buner, Swat, Shangla and Bajaur, with Buner district hit hardest.
Figures released by the Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) on October 18 put the death toll at 87, with hundreds of homes destroyed and schools and roads damaged, while rescue teams continued search operations in affected areas. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif expressed condolences to the victims' families and directed officials to speed up rescue and relief work.
Pakistan's monsoon season, running roughly from June into September, regularly brings flooding and landslides, and the steep northern and northwestern valleys, where settlements line the rivers, face especially high risk. This mid-October downpour came at the very end of the season, after earlier monsoon flooding had already struck multiple parts of the country this year. (GSM, based on Associated Press reporting)
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：灾区 Swat 地区的 Swat 河谷 Kalam 镇资料图，非本次灾情现场。图片来源：维基共享资源，CC BY-SA 4.0。Photo: The Swat River valley at Kalam in the affected Swat district (file photo), not the disaster site. Credit: Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.
