Rescue personnel digging through the muck and debris of the flood disaster in Libya, there is yet hope for locating survivors, according to the country’s Red Cross director on Friday.
“The hope is there, is always there, to find people alive,” said Tamer Ramadan, the head of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent’s rescue effort in the North African country.
At least 4,000 people were killed in the tsunami-sized flash flood that rushed through the Libyan coastal city of Derna on Thursday, and rescuers continued their hunt for thousands more on Friday.
Late Sunday, the massive floodwaters broke through two upstream dams, turning Derna into a desolate wasteland where entire city blocks and unfathomable hundreds of people were carried into the Mediterranean.
A key neighborhood on each side of the river, which usually dries up at this time of year, appeared as though a steam roller had come through, uprooting trees and buildings and tossing everything over the breakwaters of the port, according to an AFP photographer.
