Brazil Floods and Landslides Kill 46 in Minas Gerais as Searches Continue

Overview

• Authorities now list 46 dead and 21 missing after record downpours triggered floods, building collapses and slope failures in Juiz de Fora and Ubá.
• Juiz de Fora logged 584 millimetres of rain for February, about double the monthly norm, and the Paraibuna River overflowed, heightening structural risks.
• In the hillside neighborhood of Parque Burnier, a landslide swept away 12 homes as firefighters with sniffer dogs and volunteers comb compacted mud for the missing.
• Local governments declared a state of calamity, thousands fled homes, schools were closed, and President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva pledged humanitarian support and basic service restoration.
• Forecasters warn of additional heavy rain through Friday over saturated ground, and officials caution that the likelihood of finding survivors is low, reflecting a pattern of increasingly severe weather linked by experts to climate change.