#rio Flood death toll hits 741 in Brazil

Thu Jan 20, 2011 3:26AM

Residents look at damages caused by days of torrential rains in downtown Nova Friburgo, north of Rio de Janeiro, on January 15, 2011.

Heavy rains have put the Brazilian city of Sao Paulo on alert as the death toll from floods and mudslides in the country has killed 741 people.

Heavy rainfalls in Sao Paulo has flooded highways and disrupted traffic, prompting the mayor's office to issued a warning to the people of the city, the Associated Press reported on Wednesday.

Brazilian officials said hundreds of others were missing. They also mentioned the number of deaths might surpass 1,000 in the coming days.

A recent break in the rain in the northern towns in the state of Rio de Janeiro has provided the rescuers with the chance to step up the delivery of supplies to remote areas.

However, rescue operations were slowed down in the mountains in the village of Brejal due to worsening weather conditions and army helicopters deployed to rescue stranded survivors had to be called back.

The deadly floods last week in the southwestern Brazil cut off roads and destroyed houses and cars.

Officials say that the floods and mudslides hit so severely that the geography of the region has greatly changed.

Last Thursday, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff monitored the search and rescue operations in flood-stricken areas in Rio de Janeiro.

The newly elected president has vowed to allocate additional funds to assist the flood victims.

MA/MRS/MGH

A macabre hunt through the jungle for survivors of the Brazilian landslides

A week after the disaster, rescuers mostly find bloated bodies, but there are also moments of joy

Tom Phillips in Esperança

The search for landslide victims in Nova Friburgo, Brazil. Photograph: Felipe Dana/AP

Rafael Correia da Silva celebrated his 23rd birthday this week. He pulled on a pair of mudcaked wellingtons, filled his backpack with bottles of water and set off into the jungle to search for survivors of one of the worst natural disasters in Brazilian history.

Nearly a week after more than 700 people were killed in violent landslide and floods, hundreds of volunteer rescue workers such as Silva, a capoeira instructor from Teresópolis, are still trawling Rio's remote countryside for victims.

They hope to locate stranded, starving families who have been cut off since the destruction of roads, bridges and thousands of homes.

Mostly, they are finding bodies – bloated, decomposing cadavers floating in rivers, buried under mounds of mud, sometimes wedged into trees.

"I'm enjoying it — it's a good way to spend my birthday," said Silva, a towering martial-arts expert better known by the nickname tattooed onto his right forearm: "Jiraiya, The Incredible Ninja."

With the midday sun blazing down on Esperança, a village about 25km from Teresópolis, Silva's five-man rescue team headed for Campanha, one of the 20-odd areas still isolated, with the help of Valmeri Souza, 49, a local farmer.

They scrambled across crumbling hillsides, heaps of red earth and through dense Atlantic rainforest. Anxious glances were exchanged after Souza found fresh jaguar tracks in the jungle floor. A knife was drawn.

Ninety minutes on, the group paused for lunch at a riverside clearing. Surrounded by broken car bumpers, toilet seats, women's underwear and empty oil barrels – all dragged downriver by the floods – they tucked into a meal of bananas and biscuits, washed down with mineral water.

"We're eating lunch on top of a cemetery," said Vinicius Amorim, 20, a paramedic and volunteer.

Rafael Correia da Silva takes a break while searching for victims of the Brazilian landslides. Photograph: Tom Phillips for the Guardian

The local newspaper, O Diario de Teresópolis, has begun publishing daily, full-page lists of the deceased – with or without names. One entry read: "Dark-skinned female, 50; dark-skinned female six; white female, seven months."

The rescuers, however, refuse to abandon hope. "My intention is always to come looking for lives," said Thiago Bessa, 26, a professional mountaineer who was wearing bright orange overalls to draw the attention of passing rescue helicopters.

"If there are people up there they are stranded, hungry and thirsty. If we don't do this kind of work, they will be stranded for a long time."

Bereaved locals have attacked authorities for not responding quickly enough to the disaster.

"How long will we tolerate governments like these?" asked Jackson Vasconcelos, from the Diario de Teresópolis. "Now is a time for the silence of pain, but also for the shout of revolt."

But many rescuers, while privately furious with the pace of government intervention, prefer action to recrimination.

After nearly three hours hacking their way through dense rainforest and wading through a swamp, the group grew despondent. Reaching a murky river separating them from their target, they realized it was too wide to cross. Bessa lit a yellow-tipped cigarette.

Just as the deflated group prepared to retreat, however, spirits rose. "Look," Bessa shouted, motioning towards two white dots across the river, almost invisible through the undergrowth. "People!"

Manoel and Antonio, two brothers, with their wives and children, had been stranded since last Wednesday. Minutes later a Squirrel helicopter belonging to São Paulo's military police swept down and landed on a sand-bank.

Souza plunged into the brown waters to give the helicopter team the coordinates of the stranded victims' homes. "God willing, they will get them out," he said.

As the group trudged back through the jungle towards their next mission, Silva's birthday commemorations began with a round of applause and a barrage of irreverent jokes.

"We Brazilians never lose our sense of humour," beamed Souza. "Jokes are all we have left – we've lost everything else."

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