Death toll from violent storms and floods in Greece, Turkey and Bulgaria rises to 14 – WSVN 7News | Miami News, Weather, Sports

ISTANBUL (AP) — The death toll from heavy rains that devastated parts of Greece, Turkey and Bulgaria rose to 14 on Wednesday after rescue teams recovered seven more bodies in the three neighboring countries.

A flash flood at a campsite in northwestern Turkey near the border with Bulgaria killed at least five people – three of whom were found dead on Wednesday – and washed away bungalow houses. Rescuers were still searching for a missing person at the campsite.

Two more people died in Istanbul, Turkey’s largest city, where storms flooded hundreds of homes and workplaces in several neighborhoods on Tuesday.

The victims in Istanbul included a 32-year-old Guinean national who was trapped in his basement apartment in the low-income Kucukcekmece district, Turkish broadcaster HaberTurk TV reported. The other was a 57-year-old woman who died after being swept away by floods in another neighborhood, private news agency DHA reported.

According to the Istanbul governor’s office, more than 1,750 homes and businesses in the city were affected by the rising floods. This included a number of shops in Ikitelli district, where flooding washed parked vehicles and mud into furniture stores, destroying goods, DHA reported.

Turkish media reports said flooding also hit a container and truck parking lot on the outskirts of the city, where people found shelter by climbing onto the roof of a restaurant.

In Greece, record rainfall claimed at least three lives near the city center of Volos and in Karditsa further west, according to the fire department. Three people were reported missing.

Authorities on Wednesday banned traffic in Volos, the nearby mountainous region of Pelion and the resort island of Skiathos, where many households remained without electricity or running water. Traffic was also blocked in two other regions of central Greece near Volos, while the storms were expected to last at least until Thursday afternoon.

In Bulgaria, a storm caused flooding on the country’s southern Black Sea coast. The bodies of two missing people were recovered from the sea on Wednesday, bringing the total death toll to four.

Video showed cars and mobile homes being swept into the sea in the southern resort town of Tsarevo, where authorities had declared a state of emergency.

Most rivers in the region overflowed their banks and several bridges were destroyed, causing serious traffic problems.

Tourism Minister Zaritsa Dinkova said about 4,000 people were affected by the disaster along the entire southern stretch of Bulgaria’s Black Sea coast.

“There is a problem in transporting tourists because it is dangerous to travel by bus on the roads affected by the floods,” she added.

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