ORSK, Russia (Reuters) – Russia and Kazakhstan ordered more than 100,000 people to evacuate after rapidly melting snow swelled mighty rivers beyond breaking point, causing the area’s worst flooding in at least 70 years.
The deluge of melt water engulfed dozens of settlements in the Ural Mountains, Siberia and areas of Kazakhstan near rivers such as the Ural and Tobol, which local officials said rose meters within hours to levels highest ever recorded.
The Ural River, Europe’s third longest that flows through Russia and Kazakhstan into the Caspian, broke through a dam on Friday, flooding the town of Orsk, just south of the Ural Mountains.
Downstream, water levels in Orenburg, a city of about 550,000 people, rose toward the critical level of 9.3 meters as sirens warned that major flooding was imminent. The water level is currently 9.14 meters.
Sirens in Kurgan, a city on the Tobol River, a tributary of the Irtysh, warned the population to evacuate immediately. A state of emergency was also declared in Tyumen, a major oil-producing region in Western Siberia, the world’s largest hydrocarbon basin.
“Difficult days are still ahead of the Kurgan and Tyumen regions,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “There’s a lot of water coming in.”
President Vladimir Putin spoke with President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev about Kazakhstan, where more than 86,000 people have been evacuated due to floods. Tokayev said the flood was probably the worst in 80 years.
The most severely affected areas are the regions of Atyrau, Aktobe, Akmola, Kostanai, East Kazakhstan, North Kazakhstan and Pavlodar, most of which border Russia and are crossed by rivers originating in Russia such as the Ural and Tobol.
In Russia, anger erupted in Orsk as at least 100 Russians begged the Kremlin chief for help and shouted “shame on you” at local officials who they said had done too little.
The Kremlin said Putin was constantly updated on the situation but that he had no immediate plans to visit the flood zone as local and emergency officials were doing their best to cope with the deluge.
EVACUATE NOW
In Kurgan, a region with around 800,000 residents, drone footage showed traditional wooden Russian houses and the golden kupolas of Russian Orthodox churches stranded in a vast expanse of water.
In Orenburg, a city of more than half a million people, residents rowed the streets as if they were rivers. Dams and embankments were strengthened as the Ural River reached a height of almost 10 meters.
Russian officials said some people ignored requests to evacuate. Kurgan Governor Vadim Shumkov urged residents to take the warnings seriously.
“We understand you very well: it is difficult to leave your belongings and move somewhere at the request of local authorities,” Shumkov said.
“It’s better to laugh together at the hydrologists later and praise God for the miracle of our common salvation. But let’s do it alive.”
In Kurgan, water levels in the Tobol are rising and Russia has said 19,000 people are at risk in the region.
Rising waters were also predicted in the Ishim River in Siberia, also a tributary of the Irtysh, which together with its parent, the Ob, forms the seventh longest river system in the world.
It was not immediately clear why this year’s floods were so severe, given that snowmelt is an annual event in Russia. Scientists say climate change has made floods more frequent around the world.