A dike burst has claimed four lives in Kokpekty village in Karaganda Oblast, Tengrinews reports citing the Emergencies Department of Karaganda Oblast.
A dike burst has claimed four lives in Kokpekty village in Karaganda Oblast, Tengrinews reports citing the Emergencies Department of Karaganda Oblast.
The dam holding the Kokpekty Water Storage Basin burst at 1:30 at night on March 31. The overflowing water flooded nearly 100 houses out of 810 in the nearby village. The mass of the spilling was was so large that the flood water reached as high as 1.5-1.8 meters in the village. The water level started subsiding only at 2:45 a.m. on March 31.
Dozens of off-road vehicles, 124 people and 15 units of special rescue equipment were immediatly dispatched into the area along with disaster medicine crews and a regiment of Civil Defense Corps of the Emergencies Ministry of Kazakhstan to evacuate people from the flooded village.
125 residents of Kokpekty village have been evacuated and four dead bodies were discovered during the rescuer operations.
The Emergency Oprations Management Headquarters and a first aid center were set in the local school of Kokpekty village.
Minister of Emergency Situations Vladimir Bozhko is personally supervising the operations at the site.