At least 10 people were killed, including two children, after torrential rains lashed the east of Bulgaria and caused flash floods on Thursday evening, authorities said. An unidentified number of people were reported to be missing.
The worst hit was the Asparuhovo neighborhood of the Black Sea port city of Varna, where at least 11 people including two children perished, Agence France-Presse reported. A seven-year-old child, who said he was with his sister and grandmother when the disaster hit, was rescued and taken to a local hospital.
The city's streets were mud-splattered with uprooted trees and clogging garbage-filled drainage canals, leaving parts of the area still impassable due to dozens of piled up smashed cars.
"Many rickety houses were totally destroyed by the water and authorities were unable to say whether their owners had survived even if they found no new victims buried under the ruins," according to AFP. "Electricity was partially restored on Friday except in the worst-affected parts where authorities refrained from switching it on due to safety concerns."
In a nearby town of Dobrich, three victims drowned and 150 people were evacuated as water level remained waist-high on Friday evening, an AFP photographer said.
With the help of helicopters, a total of 1,200 tourists, including Germans, Russians and Britons, were evacuated from the nearby resort of Albena, resort chief Krasimir Stanev said. Meanwhile, many Ukrainian children remained blocked in their hotel in the village of Kranevo.
A canal linking Lake Varna to the Black Sea, where all the floodwater drained away, dragging with it cars, furniture, garbage and uprooted trees, was being searched by navy divers, who eventually recovered two dead bodies.
Soldiers and 40 prisoners helped to evacuate people throughout the day and clean up the piles of mud and garbage from the streets of Asparuhovo.
