Sukkur devastated

About 70 per cent of Sukkur district is flooded as of today (Tuesday) while the army is trying to fill the breach developed in Tori Dike.

Many areas of Sindh and Balochistan have been flooded due to breach in the Ghouspur area of Kundhkot.

Speaking to the Express News, Brigadier Amanat said the army is mobilising all resources to fill the breach.

"We faced difficulties in transportation because this area is flooded but we are trying to fill this breach as soon as possible."

DCO Abid Ali Shah said that it will take 15 to 20 days to fill the breach.

Floodwaters sweep towards two more towns

Floodwaters swept towards two small southern towns on Tuesday as authorities managed to finally plug a breach in defences across the Indus River at Thatta.

The troops and city workers had been battling over the weekend to save Thatta, with most of the population of 300,000 fleeing the advancing waters.

"Thatta city has been declared safe after a breach in the river caused by floods at nearby Faqir Jo Goth village was fully plugged," senior city official Hadi Bakhsh Kalhoro told AFP. But he said that the fast-moving waters that left the low-lying town of Sujawal submerged on Sunday were now threatening the towns of Jati and Choohar Jamali, where official warnings have been issued to residents to evacuate.

"We are making efforts to save the two towns which have a combined population of more than 100,000," Kalhoro said, adding most had already left for safer spots.

Most people had already returned to Thatta, he said, on the western bank of the swollen Indus. But inundated Sujawal was mostly empty on Tuesday, as water flowed down its streets and troops offloaded rubber boats from their vehicles to rescue the remaining few.

Sindh government spokesman Jameel Soomro said that 147 people had been killed in the province, mostly as a result of disease triggered by the floods, and mostly women and children.

Torrential monsoon rains have triggered massive floods that have moved steadily from north to south over the past month, engulfing a fifth of the volatile country and affecting 17 million of Pakistan's 167 million people.

Southern Sindh is the worst-affected province, with 19 of its 23 districts ravaged as floodwaters have swollen the raging Indus River to 40 times its usual volume. One million people have been displaced over the past few days alone. Eight million people have been left dependent on aid for their survival and floods have washed away huge swathes of the rich farmland on which the country's struggling economy depends.

The government has confirmed 1,645 people dead and 2,479 injured but officials warn that millions are at risk from food shortages and disease.

The UN has warned that 800,000 people in desperate need of aid have been cut off by the deluge across the country and appealed for more helicopters to deliver supplies to those reachable only by air.