The two main rivers of Santiago, the Mapocho and the Maipo, overflowed their banks on Friday in some sectors after two days of heavy rains in central Chile, which left 302 people homeless and forced the closure of roads.
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The Mapocho crosses the Chilean capital, where about half of the country’s 19 million people live. El Maipo, meanwhile, is Santiago’s main water supplier. Both are born in the Andes mountain range.
The intense rains are the first of the year in this area of Chile and were concentrated in a few hours in places in the mountains and foothills, where snow usually falls. Other rivers in the central zone of Chile also overflowed, such as the Cachapoal, the Tinguiririca and the Teno.
“This is a complex precipitation front: it is the first big rain of the season and it only occurs (almost) in July; we have a structural drought that makes everything more difficult and it is a very intense rain in a very short time,” he explained. the presidential delegate of the Metropolitan Region of Santiago, Constanza Martínez. In some areas of the mountain range, the amount of rainfall is the highest since 1993, she added.
After two days of heavy rains, the authorities report 302 people whose homes were affected, 793 sheltered, and 99 homes with major damage. They also announced that on Saturday there will be a cut in the drinking water supply in a large part of the municipalities of Santiago, which will affect more than five million people. The cut is due to the growth in the flow of the Maipo River increased the turbidity of its waters and that complicates the process so that this element can be consumed by the population.
– “We didn’t think it would be that much” –
Until recently, the Mapocho was just a trickle of water that ran about 30 km from the west to the east of Santiago, due to the extensive drought that hit central Chile a decade ago. It even registered a water deficit of 89% compared to its historical average, according to official estimates.
But after the fall of 150 mm in sectors of the foothills in the last hours, the river bed grew strongly and the water overflowed in several sectors that were flooded. The Maipo, meanwhile, saw its flow increased 10 times in the last hours.
“In the foothills it has rained in a day and a half all that it rained last year in Santiago,” said the governor of the city Claudio Orrego, in a latest report on the weather situation by the authorities. At the height of the Pudahuel neighborhood, the authorities ordered the closure of the route that connects Santiago with the city of Valparaíso, because the water covered the highway. In the sector, tons of garbage dragged by the Mapocho River accumulated.
The last major overflow of the Mapocho dates back to 2016. In the south of Santiago, the Maipo is the main river in the metropolitan region and also there it presented a significant increase in its flow, with an overflow at the height of the Peach sector. “We were incredulous, we didn’t think it was going to be that much” whatever it rained, Loreto Ochoa, 38, told AFP that she was evacuated from her home by authorities overnight.
This independent worker remembers that in the 1980s “it was normal” to see the flow of the Maipo River so increased during the winter but that for many years she does not remember having seen it rain so intensely.
