Floods in Bulgaria: Hundreds evacuated, costs mount
More than 200 people were evacuated from the village of Odrintsi in Bulgaria’s Dobrich region on February 3, a day after evacuations of several hundred people from four villages at the country’s Black Sea coast in the face of floods.
Reports said that in the municipality of Satovcha alone, damage of more than 300 000 leva (about 150 000 euro) had been caused by the recent torrential rains.
The deluges caused landslides in the villages of Pletena and Osina, leaving people without drinking water because of broken water mains.
Elsewhere, in southern Bulgaria the level of the Tundzha River was reported on February 3 to have risen 20cm to 396cm. Evacuation has not been ordered in the area but people have been warned to be ready to leave if need be, public broadcaster Bulgarian National Television said.
On February 2, evacuation was ordered of four villages near the Kamchiya River because of a controlled release from the Tsonevo dam lake.
Police are guarding property in the evacuated villages.
The overall damage from the flooding, prompted by heavy rains that began on February 1, is yet to be calculated, Interior Minister Vesselin Vuchkov said on February 3. The state would assist those afffected by the floods, he said.
In the municipality of Strumyani, February 3 was a day of mourning, for a father and son who drowned in the river at a village on February 1.
Near the Rhodope mountain town of Devin, the search was continuing for the bodies of a man and a woman missing since February 1 when their car plunged into a raging river.
