At least four people died on Thursday and 15 others were injured in two separate incidents of roof and wall collapses in Lahore as heavy rainfall continued to batter the city for a second day.
According to a Rescue 1122 statement, the roof of a house, near the Bandianwala bridge in the city’s Amar Sidhu area, collapsed due to heavy rainfall, killing four people — including three children under the age of 10.
Another child, aged 10, was injured and shifted to the Lahore General Hospital.
In a separate incident, 14 others were injured as a wall of the Government Mozang Teaching Hospital, adjoining a neighbouring building, collapsed.
According to another Rescue 1122 statement, the wall collapsed onto the hospital’s waiting area, leading to the “waiting shade” collapsing and injuring 14, who were then shifted to Sir Ganga Ram Hospital.
A statement from the Water and Sanitation Agency (Wasa) Monsoon Control Room recorded the highest amount of rainfall at the Nishtar Town director office at 65mm, followed by the Johar Town SDO office at 57mm and Lakshmi Chowk at 38mm.
The locations which recieved the least amount of rainfall were Upper Mall at 3.5mm, the Mughalpura SDO office at 5mm and the airport area at 5.5mm.
Meanwhile, Punjab caretaker Chief Minister Mohsin Naqvi said that today “everything was under control”. Speaking to reporters in Lahore, he said that eight secretaries that were monitoring one whole Wasa zone each. He added that some ministers had been allotted divisions to monitor while others had gone to the divisional head quarters.
He also commented on the flood alert issued for the province, saying, “Commissioners and deputy commissioners have already started working on this. The chief secretary chaired a meeting in the morning regarding this. The whole administration is working on this.”
On Wednesday, nine people across Punjab had lost their lives in different incidents of electrocution, roof collapses, drowning and lightning. Caretaker Punjab Chief Minister Mohsin Naqvi had termed the “record” rainfall received by Lahore — 291 millimetres — as unexpected.
Lahore Commissioner Muhammad Ali Randhawa had echoed similar views, noting that such a large amount of rainfall in such a short amount of time had not been received for the past 30 years.
Wasa’s “record-breaking” claim, however, was contested by the Met Office when one of its officials, who did not want to be named, termed it “self-serving”, as it gave more time and resources to the agency to clear water from the city.
