Egypt's army said it is continuing efforts to overcome the damaging effects of floods in the Red Sea area and Upper Egypt last weekend, an army spokesperson said on Wednesday. In an official statement, the spokesperson said that specialised army personnel have been deployed in Red Sea's Ras Gharib since Tuesday with equipment to drain water and sand inside hospitals, schools and government facilities. Water vacuum trucks have been deployed in streets and main squares to restore traffic. In Upper Egypt, the army's southern command distributed 50,000 food boxes to people affected by the bad weather, which hit several villages in Sohag governorate. The army said it assigned a medical convoy to conduct checkups and provide medicine to residents. It also mobilised a veterinary medical convoy to attend to livestock. According to the statement, a technical committee was assigned to assess the extent of damages and is developing solutions to repair them. The army started on Sunday clearing roads in and out of the Red Sea town of Ras Gharib, which was nearly cut off from the world due to heavy rain. The Red Sea town was stricken with unprecedented rainfall that reached 120 million cubic metres over the weekend. On Friday and Saturday, 26 people were killed in accidents resulting from the torrential rain and flooding in several Egyptian governorates. Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi ordered a total of EGP 50 million (around $5.6 million) to be allocated as compensation to the victims of the floods nationwide, with a further EGP 50 million allocated for the urgent restoration of infrastructure in areas affected by the floods.
