Mayor of Bogotá decrees public calamity due to winter emergency

( Spanish) — The mayoress of Bogotá, Claudia López, decreed this Sunday the public calamity to address the winter emergency due to the constant rainfall in recent weeks in the country and that affects the Colombian capital.

According to the Mayor’s Office, two people died due to landslides and they are looking for a missing person.

In a statement, López explained that the public calamity measure will make it possible to provide what is necessary to care for those affected. According to the Mayor’s Office, at least three shelters have been set up where they provide shelter, emergency kits and food.

In Bogotá, 170 situations related to landslides and 1,963 damages due to rain were registered. According to the District Institute for Risk Management and Climate Change (Idiger), 397 cases of damage to sewage services, 128 flooding and 5 hailstorms that affected 1,357 families in different locations in the capital were also reported.

The president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, indicated last week that the winter season is the most serious in the last 40 years in terms of falling water. Within the framework of the United Nations Conference on Climate Change, the president pointed out that the indicators are higher than the 2010-2011 phenomenon and that there is a probability that it will last until February, March or April 2023. According to the Presidency , 2.1 trillion Colombian pesos were allocated to mitigate the consequences.