ASYAH: An 18-year-old girl and her 23-year-old sister drowned on Monday in the waters of Wadi Al-Rumma at Al-Shubaikiah town, south of Al-Rass city in Qassim province.
The family of the deceased was picnicking near the banks of Al-Rumma. The older sister jumped into the water to save her sibling and both succumbed to the strong current.
The family recovered the body of one of the drowning victims while the Civil Defense found the other body 14 hours later.
Maj. Ibrahim Abalkhail, spokesperson for the Qassim branch of the Civil Defense, confirmed the death of the two girls and warned all citizens not to swim in the water, whose currents have grown stronger in the past couple of days due to unusually heavy rainfall.
Meanwhile, Rumma, which is usually a dry ravine (wadi), besieged Al-Bandariah town in the eastern part of Qassim with flash floods sweeping through the sand dunes of Al-Asyah area. Local officials there have erected a levee of sand to protect the town.
Locals are also concerned that the powerful force of nature might break through natural barriers and flood other villages.
“If water is able to break the natural sand barrier ahead then Al-Jaalah and its neighboring towns in Al-Asyah will definitely drown,” said Hasan Al-Nahar, a resident of Al-Jaalah town.
“We pray to God that the water of this valley will stop at the sand dunes of Al-Asyah,” he added.
“We are working day and night, watching the flow of the valley down the region of Al-Asyah,” said Abdullah bin Mahdi Al-Onazi, the mayor of Al-Asyah.
Officials said they were taking precautions to face any eventuality. “An emergency team comprising municipal workers were deployed to work around the clock to provide the needed service to citizens,” he said.
Police and Civil Defense forces are monitoring the situation and controlling the increased vehicular traffic to the area as locals flock to view the natural spectacle.
“These people are posing a great challenge to our work,” said one policeman who was trying to prevent one vehicle from entering a prohibited area. “Some people do not realize the dangers of such phenomena.”
A wadi, as it is known in Arabic, is a desert ravine, caused by periodic rainfalls that remains dry most of the time and can go for years without any surface moisture. But when rain falls, these ravines can become torrents of flowing water in short periods of time.
The waters flowing through Al-Rumma right now originate in rainfalls over 300 km away that have accumulated into a powerful force of nature that threatens buildings and people alike.
