No End In Sight As Flooding Continues Unabated In Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Russia

In some of the worst flooding in recent memory, more than 114,000 people have been evacuated from their homes in Kazakhstan as floodwaters continue to rise across the region.

Unusually warm weather after heavy winter snowfalls caused the sudden melting of snow, which in turn led to the rapid swelling of rivers.

Kazakh President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev, who traveled to the partially submerged city of Petropavl (pictured), told frustrated residents who are unable to get to their homes: "We are going through tough times. This is a disaster of a national scale."

In the settlement of Karatal, in the Aqtobe Province of northern Kazakhstan, families are now sharing tents as their homes were rendered uninhabitable by the rising waters and their aftermath.

 

Another villager from Karatal, Madeniet Eleuov, is using wooden planks to support a partially collapsed wall in his flood-damaged home. 

Villagers are not only trying to salvage their homes but locate the livestock that they depend on for their livelihoods -- many of which have succumbed to the flooding and now lie scattered in the streets.

A Kazakh government handout photo shows evacuees being rescued by a military helicopter on April 15. 

Toqaev assured evacuees that the government would not leave them without assistance. "The state will take care of every citizen, every family. This is my priority," he vowed.

In Tajikistan, floodwaters are also wreaking havoc. In the Rudaki district, south of Dushanbe, residents were left to clean up after flooding hit their homes in the early hours of April 15.

Khotamsho Latifzoda, a Tajik emergency-services official, told RFE/RL's Tajik Service that damage to flooded residential buildings was "insignificant."

RFE/RL journalists on the scene said that residents were relying on each other for the cleanup, as government resources were not enough.

Lyudmila Borodina, 56, a medical worker, cries in a flooded residential area of the Russian city of Orenburg on April 13.

Flooding in Orenburg became "critical" on April 12, resulting in "mass evacuations" as the Ural River continued to rise.
 

Flooding covers a residential area in Orsk, a city with a population of 240,000 in the Orenburg region, where five people have died, including a 65-year-old man who refused to leave his home.

A state of emergency was declared in the Orenburg region on April 4 after torrential rain led to rising water levels, causing a breach in the dam in Orsk and resulting in catastrophic flooding.


 

A drone view shows a flooded area around the Dubki residential complex in Orenburg, a city of half a million people.

Russian officials in the Tyumen region of western Siberia and Kurgan in the south near the border with Kazakhstan on April 16 ordered more evacuations as the Ishim and Tobol rivers continued to swell.

 

Emergency workers clear logjams on the Malo-Chausovsky Bridge across the Tobol River on April 15 in Kurgan.

The region's governor, Vadim Shumkov, warned of a "colossal" amount of water heading toward the city of Kurgan, which has already experienced power cuts and evacuations. Shmukov said the Tobol River could see water levels rise to 11 meters, double the level where it breaks its banks in some places along its course.