Haiti Rain, Mudslides Kill at least 11
At least 11 people are reported to have died in the aftermath of torrential rain that triggered flash flooding and mudslides in Haiti.
The AP reported on Tuesday that rain hit the area of Port-au-Prince for several hours Monday night.
Runoff from nearby hills swept into city streets. Flood waters rafted debris and mud into major thoroughfares, which led to traffic jams on Tuesday, the report said. Cars were abandoned.
The Civil Protection Department head was quoted as saying that 11 people drowned or died in the mudslides. All but one of the deaths took place in the area of Port-au-Prince.
Settlements built to house refugees of the 2010 earthquake temporarily were washed away by runoff from the downpours.
Trucks evacuating residents from swollen Lake Azuei sit broken down in Thomazeau, Haiti, on Monday, June 6 (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery).
Elsewhere, Lake Azuei, the nation's biggest lake, was swelled to overflowing by earlier rain, which led to the evacuation of dozens of families on Sunday, the AP said.
Lake Azuei lies near the border with Dominican Republic about 20 miles east of Port-au-Prince.
The trigger for the cloudbursts was broad tropical low pressure spread over much of the Caribbean region since last week. This low has been unleashing localized flooding rain in the greater Caribbean region since late in the week.
In neighboring Dominican Republic, rainfall in Santo Domingo was 5.4 inches within 24 hours as of Tuesday morning, according to data accessed by AccuWeather.com.
Haiti, along with the rest of Hispaniola and the Greater Antilles, will be under threat of localized excessive rainfall through Thursday or Friday, when regional weather should tend to stabilize.
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