The Dubai airport, its driverless metro rail system and its mega roadways were submerged as heavy thunderstorms lashed the United Arab Emirates.
Desert city-state Dubai experienced an unusual start to the week as heavy thunderstorms lashed the city and parts of the UAE, flooding major roadways, airports and the city’s driverless metro rail system. According to news agencies, the storms that lashed the UAE on Tuesday dumped over a year and a half’s worth of rain on Dubai.
Fujairah is the only emirate that saw more rainfall than Dubai. The emirate on the UAE’s eastern coast, saw the heaviest rainfall Tuesday with 145 millimetres (5.7 inches) falling there.
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One person died in Ras al-Khaimah, the country’s northernmost emirate. The police there said one 70-year-old man died when his vehicle was swept away by floodwater.
Shoppers inside the Mall of the Emirates, one of the largest shopping centres in the world, were amazed to see water gushing down from the ceiling and parts of the ceiling come down due to the incessant rains which is the largest rainfall event for the country in 75 years.
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Sharjah City Centre and the Deira City Centre also suffered some damages due to the incessant rains.
At the airport, standing water lapped on taxiways as aircraft landed. The airport ended up halting arrivals Tuesday night and passengers struggled to reach terminals through the floodwater covering surrounding roads. Many motorists struggled to tow their vehicles out of the deeper-than-expected water covering some roads.
The authorities have sent tanker trucks out into the streets and highways to pump away the water. Water also entered a few homes.
Dubai received more than 142 millimetres of rainfall over a period of 24 hours. The emirate sees 94.7 millimetres of rainfall in an average year, as per data from the Dubai International Airport, the world’s busiest for international travel and a hub for the long-haul carrier Emirates.
Lightning flashed across the sky, occasionally touching the tip of the Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building.
UAE usually does not receive much rain as it is an arid nation in the Arabian Peninsula. Rain occurs only periodically during the cooler winter months. Due to the lack of rain, many roads and other areas lack adequate drainage systems causing flooding. Rain also fell in Bahrain, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
Global flight tracker Flightradar24 on its website gave the Dubai airport 5 points on the arrival delay index on Tuesday. The index forecasts arrival disruption. The higher the score, higher the likelihood of delays and cancellations.
In neighbouring Oman, a sultanate that rests on the eastern edge of the Arabian Peninsula, at least 18 people had been killed in heavy rains in recent days, according to a statement Tuesday from the country’s National Committee for Emergency Management.
That includes some 10 schoolchildren swept away in a vehicle with an adult, which saw condolences come into the country from rulers across the region.
