Authorities are desperately urging residents to flee after more heavy rain is forecast for southern Brazil.

More intense rainfall forecast for this Monday and Tuesday is expected to further worsen the devastation in the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul, which has faced the worst floods in its history since April 29, which have carried away as of today, April 13. people’s lives. 147 people, 806 seriously injured, 619,000 displaced and 127 missing. In a real war scenario, this Monday 88% of the 281.7 thousand km² of the largest state in southern Brazil with a population of 11.2 million people were partially or completely flooded.

After a truce on Friday and Saturday, which caused some rivers to begin to recede and led residents to believe that the nightmare was beginning to subside, this Sunday the region was hit again with rain, reaching 120 mm in some places, and will continue even this Monday. stronger and is expected to intensify tomorrow, Tuesday, according to warnings classified as “extreme risk” by the National Institute of Meteorology Inmet. That’s why state governor Eduardo Leite and the mayors of some of the cities most affected by the floods, such as Canoas, El Dorado do Sul, Encantado, Monsoon, Caxias do Sul and the capital Porto Alegre, are making desperate appeals to residents. not to return to their homes, but for those who had already returned, believing that the worst was over, to flee again and as quickly as possible, since rivers such as Guaiba, Cay, Takwari, Sinos and Jaqui were rising again and were about to return to flood All.

Two weeks after the heaviest rains in 65 years, the picture is of absolute devastation across almost the entire state of Rio Grande do Sul, where 447 of 497 municipalities have been hit by a tragedy affecting 2.1 million people. . To get an idea of ​​the scale of the disaster, in addition to the human tragedy, only until now, when it has not yet been possible to cover all the affected places, a preliminary assessment shows that at least 300 thousand properties were completely destroyed or damaged beyond repair, including 800 hospitals or other types of medical facilities, dozens of bridges have collapsed, and 170 roads are completely or partially blocked, making it impossible in some cases or difficult in others to provide aid to victims or to receive food, water, medicine and clothing donated by governments and anonymous citizens from other states of Brazil.