Dozens die as cold snap hits

2006-01-09 11:16

Islamabad - At least 47 people have died from a weeklong cold snap in Pakistan, local media said on Monday, with more rain and snow expected over the country's mountainous regions in the next two days.

The Meteorological Department forecast rain and snow for Tuesday in most of the country, including areas hit by a giant October 8 earthquake that killed at least 87 000 people.

Another spell of heavy rain and snow is expected in the quake zone from January 14-22.

Pakistan's Dawn newspaper reported that 47 people have died of cold and pneumonia outside the quake zone in the country's remote northern Himalayan region.

Qamar-uz Zaman Chaudhry, head of Pakistan's Meteorological Department, said they have no reports of casualties. But last week, the World Health Organisation reported 18 cold-related deaths in the quake zone over the previous six weeks.

Anectodal reports suggest many more may have died, although the deaths have not been tallied by authorities, in part because some areas are inaccessible.

Chaudhry said more than a metre of snow have fallen on mountainous areas over 1 524 metres in the past week.

Nighttime temperatures have dropped to freezing in some of the country's normally warmer, southern regions, Chaudhry said.

In Nawab Shah, a town in the southern Sindh province, nighttime temperatures have fallen to minus one degree Celsius in recent days, compared with the average January temperature of five degrees Celsius.

That's the town's lowest reading since 1970, when the mercury dropped to minus two degrees Celsius, said Mohammed Hanif, a spokesperson for the Meteorological Department.

In summer, the town's temperature can soar to more than 40 degrees Celsius.

- AP