Hundreds of houses flooded in Gorontalo

The Jakarta Post Mon, July 23 2012,


Gorontalo: Hundreds of houses in Gorontalo were flooded over the last two days, as of Sunday evening.

The flood caused by the overflowing of Serdadu tributary from Bulango River forced hundreds of residents of Moodu and Heledulaa villages to evacuate to nearby IAIN Sultan Amai student apartments.

Tahir Laendeng, head of the logistics section of the Gorontalo Natural Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB), said at least 586 people had been taking refuge at the apartments since Saturday.

Some of the evacuees had forced themselves to return home as the flood water began to recede, he said.

Aside from Moodu and Wongkaditi, other inundated neighborhoods included Kota Timur, Gorontalo city, according to Anshar, a local resident

“The flood was triggered by the overflowing of Bulango River,” he said as quoted by the Antara news agency.

Rain has fallen in Gorontalo over the past few days and has triggered landslides in Bone Bolango regency.