The eastern and western parts of Derna are now separated by a wasteland of destruction that runs across the city all the way to the Mediterranean. When the two dams outside the city burst, they unleashed a powerful flood that leveled residential blocks. A couple of blocks up north, the rubble piled up along the sides of the road rises higher and higher until it becomes a swath of debris. A purple lunch box sits under a mangle of trees and light post. Vehicles are wedged in terraces and entrances of the low-rise buildings. Pieces of metal dangle from the ceilings of gutted out stores. Only few traces are left behind of what the shops lining the street used to sell. Everything is gone,” he says.ĭerna was split into two after the flood swept entire neighborhoods. Men sit in front of their hollowed-out houses, some silent, others sobbing.Īcross the street Talal Fartas is going through what remains of his jewelry store, picking gold necklaces and bracelets from the mud. The trauma and loss are visible on every face. Tarek’s bare feet are covered in mud from walking through the side streets helping neighbors go through the wreckage of their homes. A Saturday report from the United Nations estimates at least 11,300 people are dead and 10,100 are missing in the city alone.Īpproximately 170 people have been killed outside of Derna due to the flooding, the UN report said. As he starts listing the names of the friends he lost, he breaks down in tears.Īcross the eastern Libyan city of Derna, thousands died and thousands more are still missing after a catastrophic flood hit the city in the early hours of Sunday. “Just in 15 buildings around me, 33 people died,” he says. When the water level gradually receded, he went back down to check on his neighbors, “but there was meter-high mud on the street,” he recalls. “Maybe one percent of those who lived on ground floors survived,” he says of his neighborhood around al-Fanar street. He moved the family to the rooftop, and they climbed up a water tank as the water kept rising. “The amount of water and the cars it was pushing felt like an earthquake,” he says. When he went home an hour later, it took very little time between the moment he heard the dam burst and the gushing water flooding his street. Up until 1:30 am, Storm Daniel was just wind and rain. Tarek Fahim was taking videos of the water filling behind the dam in the Derna valley in Libya late Saturday night.
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