Death toll from weather disaster in Brazil reaches 143

Sao Paulo: The death toll from the worst weather ever to hit southern Brazil’s Rio Grande do Sul state has risen to 143, with 125 people missing and more than 600,000 evacuated, the civil protection agency said. Two weeks of record rainfall have caused floods and landslides across the state, with dramatic scenes of people being rescued from floodwaters in 446 cities, including the state capital Porto Alegre, where the Guaiba River burst its banks. It has been broken, causing more than half of it to be submerged. city, Xinhua news agency reported on Sunday.

Torrential rains began on April 29 and continued into Sunday, dashing hopes of flood waters receding and causing the number of displaced people to rise from about 441,000 Saturday to 618,550 on Sunday. The National Meteorological Institute predicted more heavy rain through Monday in Brazil’s southernmost state, which borders Argentina and Uruguay. Governor Eduardo Leite said this week that it would take about 19 billion reais ($3.7 billion) to rebuild Rio Grande do Sul after the floods.

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