Page 11 - Aruba Today

WORLD NEWS A11
Tuesday 29 December 2015

Floods force thousands into shelters in South America

A man rows his boat through a flooded street in Concordia, Ar- Christmas Eve. “I’m not sure falling trees to electrocu- Vice President Gabriela Mi-
gentina, Monday, Dec. 28, 2015. Tens of thousands of people in when we’ll be able to go tion. chetti called a meeting of
several South American countries are spending the holidays in home.” Over the weekend, both several top officials to co-
shelters after massive flooding forced them from their homes. It was unclear what thou- Argentine President Mau- ordinate recovery efforts.
sands of people will find ricio Macri and Brazilian Many criticized the previ-
(AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko) when they do return to their President Dilma Rousseff ous government’s response
homes after the waters sub- toured affected areas and to heavy flooding in the
NATACHA PISARENKO uees were also dealing with side. At least 20,000 have announced measures to Buenos Aires province in
PETER PRENGAMAN heat, humidity, mosquitoes been evacuated in Argen- help people recover and August, which also forced
Associated Press and snakes that thrive in tina. Neighboring Para- rebuild their homes. tens of thousands to evac-
CONCORDIA, Argentina swamp-like conditions. guay has been hardest hit, Meteorologists attribute uate and became a flash-
(AP) — Massive, wide- Concordia, about 264 miles with 144,000 evacuated, the heavy rains to the El point ahead of presidential
spread flooding forced (425 kilometers) north of mostly in areas bordering Nino weather phenome- elections.
tens of thousands of peo- Buenos Aires, was among the Paraguay River. Several non, which happens every “I can only get within
ple in South America to places that were particu- thousand have also been few years when the Pacific two blocks of my house,”
take refuge in shelters on larly hard hit. Some houses evacuated in Uruguay and Ocean warms up around said Alejandra Peritas, a
Monday, as they endured had water nearly up to the southern Brazil. the equator. While rains 43-year-old in Concordio
heat, bugs and dirty run- roofs, and people made The floods have been re- had subsided in many ar- who took her two children
ning water because of their way around town in sponsible for at least eight eas by Monday afternoon, to a shelter. “I can only see
contaminated sewer lines. canoes. deaths: six in Paraguay and more rain was expected the roof.
The floods were caused “The water (from sinks) is two in Uruguay. Causes of over the next couple days. The rest is covered in
by heavy rains and bulg- contaminated and bugs death have ranged from In Buenos Aires on Monday, water.”q
ing rivers over the last sev- are everywhere,” said Jo-
eral days and come at the sefina Monson, a 33-year-
beginning of the South- old who has been in the
ern Hemisphere’s summer shelter with her husband
months. That means evac- and young daughters since

Venezuela chopper crashes in Colombia

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Villegas said it posed no se-
A Venezuelan military heli-
copter has crashed in Co- curity threat.
lombia and the pilot and
co-pilot are injured. Venezuelan President
The Bell helicopter belong-
ing to Venezuela’s National Nicolas Maduro in August
Guard was inspecting the
border on Monday when it closed all major crossings
fell about 10 meters (yards)
to the ground. It crash along the 2,200-kilometer
landed on the Colombian
side of the La Guajira pen- (1,400) mile border and de-
insula on South America’s
northernmost tip. ported scores of Colombi-
It’s unclear what caused
the crash but Colombian ans to stamp out what he
Defense Minister Luis Carlos
considers to be large-scale

smuggling. Tensions remain

high between the coun-

tries.

The two crew members

were rescued by local

residents and escorted

to Venezuela for medical

attention.q