LAHORE, Aug 27: Two teen-aged brothers died while their three younger siblings and parents suffered serious injuries in a roof collapse in Shahdara believed to be caused by Sunday night’s short-but-furious rainstorm.
Khan Agha, his wife Jamal Bibi and thier four children — Azam (16), Noor (14), Shabbir, Raqeeb and Raza - were in their single-story house in Pathan Colony when its roof caved in reportedly due to heavy rain.
The Rescue 1122 personnel reached the spot and shifted the injured to a nearby hospital, where Azam and Noor succumbed to their injuries while the condition of Shabbir
and Raqeeb was stated to be critical.
Meanwhile, six labourers were injured in Nawankot when a wall behind which they had taken refuge to save themselves from the sudden fury of elements collapsed. Names of the injured could not be ascertained.
The fierce storm which lashed the city at around 8.30pm disrupted power supply, uprooted trees and billboards and inundated low-lying localities in various city areas.
According to the local Met office, the windstorm and the downpour were generated by a low pressure developed in the evening over central Punjab. It said it had warned the civic authorities about the sudden development of the system an hour before the storm.
The maximum gust of the storm was 86.9km per hour at the airport and 64km per hour in the main city.
The Met office recorded 20mm of rain at the airport and 37mm at its Jail Road center within 30 minutes of the beginning of the storm. The rain was continuing till the filing of this report at around 9.45pm.
Most of the motorists kept off the roads to prevent accidents during the storm, while the branches of uprooted trees and falling billboards blocked those who dared to move ahead.
Earlier in the day it remained partly cloudy in the city. The maximum temperature was 37 degrees C and the minimum 26.8 degrees C with 65 per cent humidity in the morning and 58 per cent in the evening.
The Met office forecast chances of more thunderstorm and rain in the city during the next 24 hours.