Heat wave kills at least 11 people in India

This Wednesday (19), India faces extreme weather conditions that have caused strong heat waves, landslides and floods, killing at least 11 people since the beginning of the week, including a woman and her three daughters buried alive in a state northeast, authorities and media said.

The capital, New Delhi, experienced its hottest night in six years on Tuesday, with hospitals in the city of 20 million reporting at least five deaths from heatstroke this week, the Times of India newspaper said.

Floods and landslides triggered by incessant rains in the northeastern state of Assam killed at least six people on Tuesday night, authorities said.

“A landslide buried a woman and her three daughters alive,” a state disaster management official, Siju Das, said by phone.

“Their house was on a hillside and they died on the spot around midnight,” he said, adding that the bodies were recovered after a three-hour search operation by rescuers.

“A three-year-old child was also killed.”

Billions of people across Asia face extreme heat this summer, in a trend that scientists say has been worsened by man-made climate change.

Since March, temperatures have soared to 50C in Delhi and the neighboring desert state of Rajasthan, while more than twice the usual number of heat wave days have been recorded this season in the northwest and east of the country.

These conditions resulted from fewer thunderstorms as well as warm winds blowing from neighboring arid regions.

In Assam, more than 160,000 people were affected, with waters exceeding the danger level in the Kopili, one of the largest tributaries of the Brahmaputra, which is among the largest rivers in India.

More than 30 people have died in the state since late May in floods and landslides triggered by heavy rains, officials said.