Heavy Rain, Mudslides Leave 300 Dead, 600 Missing In Sierra Leone

More than 300 people are left dead and at least 600 others goes missing in Western Africa’s, and one of the world’s poorest countries, Sierra Leone due to heavy rains and mudslides.

President Ernest Bai Koroma visited one of the worst hit areas, Regent, and fought back tears witnessing the devastation. He said it was “overwhelming us.”

Koroma issued a desperate appeal for help and said the country need urgent support as entire communities have been wiped out.

Meanwhile, foreign governments have started mobilizing aid including Israel that pledged to provide the people blankets, medicines, clean water and other essentials. British International Development Secretary Priti Patel too vowed to offer required support to the Sierra Leone government.

The president also toured central morgue and Connaught hospital in Regent. He said to be opening an emergency response center in the city with four registration centers.

Red Cross details 300 were dead and 600 missing while a morgue assessment reveals about 400 people have lost lives.

On Tuesday evening 150 burials took place, said Freetown city council official Sulaiman Zaino Parker.

He added more bodies will be laid to rest in graves in nearby Waterloo alongside the victims of Ebola crisis, the last humanitarian disaster of the country.

Parker mentioned, “We have started burying some of the mutilated and decomposed bodies. All the corpses will be given a dignified burial with Muslim and Christian prayers.”