ISLAMABAD, 12 February 2007 — Several people died and over a dozen were injured yesterday after roofs of their houses collapsed in heavy rains in Pakistan, the government said.
Five deaths were caused when the thatched, mud-built roofs of the houses collapsed in separate rain-related incidents in the North West Frontier Province, the province’s Home Department said in Peshawar, the provincial capital.
A woman and her son were crushed to death by debris from the collapsing roof of their home in Jaroba, a village east of Peshawar, the department said. Three other children were injured in the accident.
Two brothers, 7 and 9-year-old, died and six other people were injured in a rain-toppled home in Sarband, another village on the outskirts of Peshawar. A 5-year-old boy died and his mother and three other relatives were injured in their crumbling home in Bajur, a tribal region northeast of Peshawar, the department said. Heavy winter monsoon rains started lashing many parts of the province and elsewhere in Pakistan since Friday, according to the state-run Meteorological Department in Peshawar, which forecast more rains for the next two days.
The country has been in the grip of an unprecedented cold wave for the past several days with rains and snowfall on mountainous areas making lives of the people miserable. Those affected by the October 2005 earthquake and living in makeshift shelters are the worst sufferers.
“The cold spell will continue for another two or three days,” leading meteorologist Dr. Qamaruzzaman Chaudhry told Arab News yesterday.
Two persons were killed in Lahore’s Allama Iqbal Town when their under-construction house collapsed. Heavy rains lashed most areas in Punjab, Balochistan and federal capital Islamabad also.
Some areas in Balochistan — Pishin, Kuclak, Khanozai, Ziarat and Sheela Bagh — were cut off from the rest of country due to heavy snowfall.
