SANA’A, Yemen — A UN agency has issued a warning for the rare tropical cyclone ‘Sagar’ in the Gulf of Aden, saying it threatens flash flooding, as authorities say it has struck Yemen’s southern coastline.
The Health Ministry’s emergency centre said an elderly woman has died after her house caught fire Friday because of the storm, and that her family failed to rescue her in Khor Maskar in Aden.
Tropical Cyclone #Sagar - Massive floods in #Yemen pic.twitter.com/v5isYBpYXa
— Mohamed Farah (@m0farah) May 17, 2018
Another building was evacuated after a balcony collapsed.
The centre said flash flooding had caused sewage to pour onto the streets of the city that has suffered severe infrastructure deterioration since the country’s civil war began in 2015.
Tropical Cyclone #Sagar is bringing life-threatening heavy rainfall to Somalia, Djibouti and Yemen this weekend: https://t.co/ZGsHIBIHaJ pic.twitter.com/7l3JokNAuP
— The Weather Channel (@weatherchannel) May 19, 2018
The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations says the heavy rains could cause favourable breeding conditions for desert locusts.
—AP
