On Thursday, the Russian city of Orenburg battled rising water levels soon after major rivers in both Russia and Kazakhstan overflowed their banks, making the most severe flooding witnessed in the region in almost a hundred years.
The surge of melted snow and ice has compelled more than 110,000 individuals to evacuate from their residences in the Ural Mountains, Siberia, and Kazakhstan. This inundation occurred as prominent rivers like the Ural, which traverses Kazakhstan before emptying into the Caspian Sea, breached their embankments.
Residents in the city said that the waters of the Ural rose too swiftly and far beyond the breaking point forcing them to evacuate homes with just children, pets and some basic belongings.
“It came very quickly at night,” Taisiya, 71, told Reuters in Orenburg, a city of 550,000 about 1,200 km (750 miles) east of Moscow. “By the time I got ready, I couldn’t get out.”
The flooding has hit the Urals region of Russia and northern Kazakhstan the hardest. Almost the whole city has been underwater and the Ural rose another 32 cm to 10.54 meters and 124 cm above the level considered by local authorities.
However, water levels are also increasing in the southern areas of Western Siberia, known as the largest hydrocarbon basin globally. Additionally, some areas near the Volga, Europe’s largest river, are experiencing rising waters.
