At least 40,000 people in KwaZulu-Natal province have been left homeless, without electricity or running water in the past week, while water services have also been shut down and operations in one of Africa’s busiest ports in Durban have been suspended. The state television station SABC broadcast today that the death toll is now 398, while 27 people are still missing. Citizens are now facing further disasters as more rainfall is forecast in the coming days. Gloria Linda said she was “so worried” as she was sheltered under a large umbrella on a muddy road near where she lived in Kwandengezi, about 30 kilometers (20 miles) inland from Durban’s main east coastal town. Image: Further heavy rainfall is expected in the coming days He added: “Many houses have been damaged, many people have died. “We have no water, no electricity, even our phones are dead. We are stuck.” He then started walking on a dirt road to attend a funeral of a friend who was killed by the floods. Many relatives are searching for the missing members of their families among the wreckage, but have only found the bodies of the victims. Elsewhere, a family stood in the rain looking at the collapsed metal shack, one of the many houses destroyed. Muzi Mzobe, 59, was renting a house to tenants but was killed in the floods. He said: “We called the police, we called the ambulance, we called the fire department, none of them answered in time. “Four people were covered in the rubble here and when we took them out, they were already gone.”
