Early this Thursday morning, the main access roads to the city center were clogged with cars, with traffic intensifying without the possibility of making detours. Other Luandans suffered from difficulties in arranging transport to go to work, with many giving up and returning home, while others chose to walk.
At other points, such as on the road from Kimbango to Golf 2, traffic was even more complicated due to a bridge that collapsed under the force of the floods.
The village of Viana, on the outskirts of Luanda, was one of the most affected by the storm and in many areas the large concentration of rubbish made it difficult for the water to flow over thousands of homes.
Several neighborhoods are also without power, due to the interruption in the supply of the National Electricity Distribution Company (ENDE), with the rain causing flooding of electrical installations and falling poles.
In the so-called “Lagoa do Coelho”, a retention basin at Estalagem (Viana) several people, with no other possibility of passage, crossed with water almost up to their waists or created improvised rafts to pass by force by rowing.
Many residents tried to defend their homes against the ingress of water by barricading themselves with sandbags, while for others it was only a matter of emptying flooded backyards using simple buckets.
The floods reached areas considered noble such as Talatona, a suburban neighborhood of Luanda where most of the companies and several luxury condominiums are located, where many vehicles were almost submerged.
Lusa tried throughout the day to assess the damage and determine the existence of victims, with the civil protection authorities promising information for later, as they are still in the data collection phase.
In an evening interview with Public Television of Angola, the spokesman for the Civil Protection and Fire Service, Faustino Minguês, said that they are working hard to allow the water to flow.
"The works to remove silting from some passageways, the reprofiling of the retention basins, as well as the cleaning of the gutters, will allow the normal flow of water in different parts of the capital city", according to the official, quoted by Jornal de Angola.
