BAHA, 4 January — Four people, including two women and two children, drowned in flash floods near Baha on Monday, press reports said yesterday.
The accident occurred when the flood waters swept away a car carrying a Saudi family of six in the middle of the Reem valley in the Qalwa governorate, Al-Riyadh Arabic daily said. However, two elderly people were rescued from the car by on-lookers before it fully submerged. They could not save the other passengers because of the powerful current.
Civil defense teams, notified by witnesses, arrived at the scene and pulled out the bodies of the two women and a four-year-old girl from the car after a long search. The body of the other girl, who was only one-and-a-half years old, was found far away from the accident site the next day, the newspaper said.
A Saudi woman had drowned in the sea off Shaqiq in Jizan province last week. Fatima, 32, had come from Asir with her husband and children to spend the Eid holidays at the coastal town. A huge wave carried her away to deep waters when she was standing on the sea shore.
In other accidents, a Saudi girl in Beqaa lost her eye when playing with firecrackers with other children on the day of Eid, the paper said. In Mandaq, a fire caused by firecrackers burned carpets valued at more than SR10,000 at a house. The paper pointed out that the fire caused by the firecrackers in Mandaq could have destroyed the whole house.
