MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Over 4,700 Uruguayans displaced due to heavy storms

A return to normalcy will depend on each department, President Lacalle explained while touring parts of the country affected by the floods (Pic L. Maine)

A total of 4,722 Uruguayans were displaced from their homes Thursday as heavy rains caused severe floods in the departments (provinces) of Canelones, Colonia, Florida, Durazno, San Jose, Paysandu, and Rivera, the National Emergency System (Sinae) reported. President Luis Lacalle Pou visited some of the affected areas.

According to the Sinae, there were also 995 people evacuated by relief teams and 3,727 self-evacuated.

In Florida, 145 people were evacuated and 1,850 people were self-evacuated, totaling 1,995 people displaced from their homes. Lacalle Pou toured the area which was left without drinking water during the emergency and heard the complaints of the affected residents.

Classes were suspended Thursday and Friday in that part of the country as a result of the weather phenomenon. Regarding the return to normalcy, the head of state explained that “it will depend on the department, it will depend on the neighborhood, the spirit is not to lose classes, if there is a school that has been flooded, that has no water, that has no light, it is very complex to do it, it will depend on each department, each neighborhood.”

In this scenario, Uruguay's Meteorological Institute (Inumet) forecasts a “gradual increase” in temperature from Sunday and a Tourism Week - the lay version of the Easter Week holiday between March 25 and 31- “with good sunshine.”

Inumet Director Néstor Santayana said that starting Sunday temperatures “will be on the rise” and that precipitation is not expected “at least” for the next seven days.

”Sunday will begin a gradual increase in temperature and stability is maintained throughout the Tourism Week (Easter Week) with good presence of sunshine,“ Santayana stressed.

He also highlighted that the storms this week took place just the way they had been announced, ”which led us to raise the orange level to a red alert.“ In the center-east and south of the country there were between 100 and 150 millimeters of rainfall while the ”most intense“ hail and wind phenomena focused on the center and north. ”The most intense gust was 137 kilometers per hour in Tacuarembó,” Santayana noted.

The last time the Inumet had issued a red alert was on September 22, 2018.