Torrential rains cause death and flooding

Torrential rains caused severe flooding in Senegal and southeastern Mauritania at the weekend, cutting roads, washing out crops and drowning livestock. Seven people died in Senegal, where many mud-built houses collapsed, according to the national fire service. The Moroccan news agency MAP meanwhile reported three deaths in Mauritania. Officials in both countries expressed fears that the extremely wet conditions, following on from last year's drought, could lead to swarms of locusts forming in both countries. Matam, a town in the arid northeast of Senegal on the Mauritanian frontier, recorded 131 mm of rain, its heaviest downpour since 1984. Many cattle, goats and sheep were carried away by floodwaters in the surrounding area. Heavy rainfall was also recorded around the towns of Kaolack, Nioro and Kaffrine, about 150 km southeast of the capital Dakar. Ibrahima Gabar Diop, the head of Senegal's fire service, said many farmers had lost the food stocks they were relying on to see them through until the next harvest towards the end of this year. Large numbers of people made homeless by the floods had sought shelter in schools and the main road leading east from Dakar to the Malian frontier had been cut after a bridge collapsed, he added. Locusts have also begun appearing in large numbers around Tambacounda in southeastern Senegal, the breadbasket of the country. And MAP agricultural expers in Mauritania as saying that the first decent rains in the southeast after three years of drought could lead to swarms of locusts forming there too. In Senegal, Diop warned that further heavy downpours were likely before the rainy season comes in about six weeks time.