Heavy rain accompanied by strong winds hit Mumbai, India’s financial capital, on Monday, killing at least eight people, uprooting trees and causing power outages in many parts of the city, officials said.
The deaths were caused by a big billboard that fell on a crowd of people seeking shelter, a local official said.
Rescue teams from India’s national disaster force and local police officers were called in to help free dozens of people trapped in the rubble in the eastern suburb of Ghatkopar. A video on social media showed the sign shaking in the storm before falling.
A witness, Swapnil Khupte, saying that when the rains and wind began to get worse, he and his friends had taken refuge in a gas station near the sign. When it collapsed, he said, many of the people trapped below were women and children.
“All the cars, bicycles and people that were there were stuck,” he told a local news agency. “We help people get out and somehow manage to escape.”
Mumbai, home to more than 18 million people, sits on a peninsula surrounded by the sea. Like many other Indian cities, it is prone to severe flooding and rain-related accidents during the monsoon season, which runs from June to September.
In recent years, India has experienced an extreme weather pattern, including unprecedented heat waves and severe flooding. The arrival of monsoon this year has also caused damage and fatalities in many other parts of the country.
In total, 64 people injured when the sign fell on Monday were admitted to the hospital. saying Bhushan Gagrani, an official with the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation, which runs Mumbai. One of them was listed in critical condition.
The rains were followed by dust storms which some neighbors compared to a scene from a Hollywood movie. Mumbai airport authorities said they had diverted more than a dozen incoming flights and suspended operations for more than an hour.
Although Monday’s rains provided some relief from the stifling heat, many parts of the city were flooded and there were long traffic jams.