A scene after cloud burst at Shamej in Rampur, in Shimla district, Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024.
Credit: PTI Photo
Shimla: Family members wailed as rescue teams on Thursday battled to trace about 30 people missing after a cloudburst in Shimla district's Rampur subdivision.
"I heard the sound of gushing waters and came out of my house only to find the area around flooded. I immediately rushed to a safe place with my family," said Nali Ram, a senior citizen who along with his family members managed to escape the flash flood that followed.
A cloudburst near Shrikhand Mahadev on Wednesday night triggered flash floods in Sarpara, Ganvi and Kurban nallahs, as a result, the water in Samej Khud in Shimla district’s Rampur rose, leaving two people dead and about 30 missing, Shimla Superintendent of Police Sanjeev Kumar Gandhi told PTI.
The swelling of Samej Khud resulted in a havoc in Shimla and Kullu districts.
"My father-in-law who was working on a project has been missing since last night and I along with other relatives came here in search of him,” Neel Dutt said.
As 30 people remain missing, teams of the Army, National Disaster Response Force, Indo-Tibetan Border Police, State Disaster Response Force, police and home guards are conducting rescue operations and the help of drones is being taken to locate the missing persons.
"We have to search about a 100-km area, some of which is inaccessible and drones are being used to locate the missing people,” Gandhi told PTI on Thursday.
However, the administration is still assessing the losses, he said.
The state emergency operation centre said the cloudbursts took place in Nirmand, Sainj and Malana areas in Kullu, Padhar in Mandi and Rampur in Shimla districts.
A resident of Kullu’s Malana village, Maini Devi (32) said, “Around 3 am, there was a huge sound from the Malana Dam site downstream and in the morning we got to know that it was breached.” Mohan Lal Kaptiya, Pradhan of Sarpara Panchayat under which Samej falls, claimed that about 29-30 houses, primary health centre and school had been washed away in the flash floods.
The road connectivity to Malana village is cut off, triggering people to go hoarding the essential commodities causing the village shops to go dry, she added.