Many people in the city of Orsk, Russia had to leave their homes because a big dam broke and caused a lot of flooding.
This morning, the water level went up by 16 feet because the Ural river flooded the city. At least three people died because of the flood.
The city near the border of Russia and Kazakhstan evacuated 711 people, including 210 children. The city has a population of 230,000.
Two out of the three parts of Orsk are being emptied out because of the possibility of flooding. This would affect around 4,000 homes and over 10,000 people. Officials shared this information with the Russian state news agency TASS.
Before, there was a big problem in the Orenburg region because the water levels went up a lot because the ice melted. So the government had to declare an emergency for the whole area.
Orsk is the area that has been affected the most, but Vladimir Putin’s government is dealing with very bad flooding in more than 30 areas in Russia. The flooding is even worse than normal and it’s expected to get even worse next week.
“The dam in the Old Town near Orenburgskaya Street broke,” the city administration said.
A video shows people and pets being taken to safety in boats because they were flooded for up to two weeks.
The local prosecutor’s office said the dam broke because it wasn’t taken care of properly.
In the past few days, heavy flooding has affected a large area in Russia and parts of Kazakhstan, including areas near the Siberian and Urals mountains.
Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said that the flooding could be the biggest natural disaster in Kazakhstan in 80 years in terms of how much land is affected and how many people it hurts.
“We need to learn from these big floods,” he said.
Big machines were brought to a dangerous situation to try to fix a break in a dam in Orsk, a city with 230,000 people, about 1,100 miles east of Moscow.
Orsk mayor Vasily Kozupitsa said: “The situation is very serious and difficult. ”
Because the water level from the upper part of the Urals rose a lot, the dam couldn’t hold the weight.
The dam near the village of Stroiteley broke.
He said: “Today, in a few hours, the water has gone up by 4 meters (16ft). ”
In Orenburg city, Mayor Sergey Salmin said things are very serious because over 300 houses are already flooded.
“He said to leave right away, before the situation gets dangerous. ”
This year, floods are getting worse because it’s been really hot and the snow on the mountains is melting.
Warnings showed that the Uver River in Novgorod region, the Protva River in Kaluga region, and the Sudogda River in Vladimir region had high levels of danger.
A state of emergency was declared in five areas of the Chelyabinsk region because of a flood.
Critics are saying that Putin has not focused on important things like flood protection while he spent money on hypersonic missiles and fought a war in Ukraine.
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