Italy sends rescue mission to help in Belgium floods

Rome: Rescue experts from Italy’s civil protection agency have travelled to help their counterparts in Belgium where more than 20 people have been killed in the worst floods in living memory.

The group of firefighters and divers – specialised in search and rescue in flooded areas – travelled from Venice last night on board an Italian military aircraft.

The team is part of an international civil protection mission undertaking rescue operations in flood-ravaged Belgium which had appealed to Italy for help.

In addition to rescuers from Venice, Padua, Treviso and Vicenza, Italy sent jeeps, inflatable boats and a helicopter to Liège.

This afternoon the Italian rescue team announced that it had saved 40 people trapped in their houses in the area of Tillf, south of Liège.

Torrential rains, storms and winds have battered Germany, Luxembourg and Belgium in a climatic disaster that has caused more than 126 deaths and left around 1,300 people unaccounted for in rising waters.

The death toll in Germany now stands at over 100 while in Belgium at least 20 people have lost their lives.