UAE struggles to recover after heaviest recorded rainfall ever
— The United Arab Emirates tried to wring itself out Thursday after the heaviest recorded rainfall ever to hit the desert nation, with its main airport allowing more flights even as floodwater still covered portions of major highways and communities.
Dubai International Airport, the world’s busiest for international travel, allowed global carriers on Thursday morning to again fly into Terminal 1 at the airfield. And long-haul carrier Emirates, crucial to EastWest travel, began allowing local passengers to arrive at Terminal 3, their base of operations.
However, Dubai Airports CEO Paul Griffiths said in an interview with The Associated Press that the airfield needed at least another 24 hours to resume operations close to its usual schedule. Meanwhile, one desert community in Dubai saw floodwaters continue to rise Thursday to as much as 3 feet as civil defense officials struggled to pump out the water.
“We were looking at the radar thinking, ‘Goodness, if this hits, then it’s going to be cataclysmic,’” Griffiths said of the storm. “And indeed it was.”
The airport ended up needing 22 tankers with vacuum pumps to get water off its grounds. Griffiths acknowledged that taxiways flooded during the rains, though the airport’s runways remained free of water to safely operate. Online videos of a FlyDubai flight landing with its reverse thrust spraying out water caught the world’s attention.
“It looks dramatic, but it actually isn’t that dramatic,” Griffiths said.
Emirates, whose operations had been struggling since the storm Tuesday, had stopped travelers flying out of the UAE from checking into their flights as they tried to move out connecting passengers. Pilots and flight crews also had a hard time reaching the airport given the water on roadways.
But on Thursday, Emirates lifted that order to allow customers into the airport. That saw some 2,000 people come into Terminal 3, again sparking long lines, Griffiths said.
Others who arrived at the airport described hourslong waits to get their baggage, with some just giving up to head home or to whatever hotel would have them.
The UAE, a hereditarily ruled, autocratic nation on the Arabian Peninsula, typically sees little rainfall in its arid desert climate. However, a massive storm forecasters had been warning about for days blew through the country’s seven sheikhdoms.
By the end of Tuesday, more than 5.59 inches of rainfall had soaked Dubai over 24 hours. An average year sees 3.73 inches of rain at Dubai International Airport. Other areas of the country saw even more precipitation.
Meanwhile, intense floods also have struck neighboring Oman in recent days. Authorities on Thursday raised the death toll from those storms to at least 21 killed.
The UAE’s drainage systems quickly became overwhelmed Tuesday, flooding out neighborhoods, business districts and even portions of the 12-lane Sheikh Zayed Road highway running through Dubai.
The state-run WAM news agency called the rain “a historic weather event” that surpassed “anything documented since the start of data collection in 1949.”
In a message to the nation late Wednesday, Emirati leader Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the ruler of Abu Dhabi, said authorities would “quickly work on studying the condition of infrastructure throughout the UAE and to limit the damage caused.”
On Thursday, people waded through oil-slicked floodwater to reach cars earlier abandoned, checking to see if their engines still ran. Tanker trucks with vacuums began reaching some areas outside of Dubai’s downtown core for the first time as well. Schools remain closed until next week.
Authorities have offered no overall damage or injury information from the floods, which killed at least one person.