All three deaths -- of two elderly people aged 70 and 84 and an 11-year-old girl -- were reported due to collapsed homes in two towns in Paraguay, which has been battered by downpours accompanied by tornadoes and rainstorms.
"We are doing our best to reach families in need. We have reports of major damage in about 40 locations," the head of the national emergency office Arsenio Zarate said Friday.
Some 30,000 people in Paraguay have been affected by storms, he added, with more than 600 families evacuated in Ayolas on the banks of the Parana River.
"We can say that El Nino has arrived in Paraguay and will probably remain until the first three months of 2024," meteorologist Eduardo Mingo told AFP.
El Nino is typically associated with warming ocean surface temperatures in the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean.
It can bring severe droughts to southern Asia, coupled with increased rainfall in parts of southern South America, the southern United States, the Horn of Africa and central Asia.
The latest El Nino follows hot on the heels of a particularly harsh spell of La Nina, which causes the opposite weather effects and had the south of the South American continent gripped in an historic drought earlier this year, causing crop failures and shortages of drinking water.
In Brazil, heavy rains caused flooding and landslides in the southern states of Parana and Santa Catarina this week, but no fatalities, according to the government.
A new cyclone was expected to bring more rain, hail and strong winds Friday to three southern states as well as Brasilia and Rio de Janeiro, with "a risk of power failures, damage to plantations, falling trees and flooding," said the Inmet meteorological agency.
Two people have died in the past month and 16,000 have had to leave their homes because of floods in Parana state, according to officials.
The wet conditions have also affected the Iguazu falls shared by Brazil and Argentina, with tourist access shuttered due to dangerously high water levels.
Argentina's naval hydrography service has also warned of high water levels in the River Plate that Argentina shares with Uruguay, where almost 3,000 people have had to leave their homes in the country's north due to flooding, with more expected.
Sixteen dead as Storm Ciaran batters Western Europe
Montemurlo, Italy (AFP) Nov 3, 2023 -
The death toll from Storm Ciaran rose to at least 16 across Western Europe on Friday, as heavy downpours and record winds brought travel chaos.
At least six people died in the central Tuscany region, Italian authorities announced on Friday, declaring a state of emergency as weather specialists reported record rainfall.
Another three people were killed off the coast of Portugal on Friday when a yacht ran aground north of Lisbon in strong swells.
In Italy, the rescue services were called out to dozens of incidents across Tuscany to help motorists stranded in flooded tunnels or hemmed in by trees brought down by the winds.
Tuscany governor Eugenio Giani said the dead in the Italy storms included an 85-year-old man found drowned on the ground floor of his house in Montemurlo, northwest of Florence.
"What happened tonight in Tuscany has a name: climate change," Giani wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Residents were busy mucking out homes, garages and cellars swamped by the floodwaters, throwing damaged furniture and appliances onto the street, said an AFP photographer on the scene.
Florence mayor Dario Nardella described the situation as "critical" in the city, as the level of the Arno River continued to rise.
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni announced an initial state aid package of five million euros (around $5.4 million) for the region as she confirmed a state of emergency to fast-track funding and resources.
- Record winds in France -
Three people aboard the Danish-flagged sailboat that capsized off a beach at Santa Cruz north of Lisbon were found dead on the shore near the boat's wreckage on Friday, a navy spokesman told AFP.
Trees felled by gale-force winds caused several of the other deaths in Europe. In the Belgian city of Ghent, falling branches killed a five-year-old Ukrainian boy and a 64-year-old woman on Thursday.
Falling trees had earlier killed a lorry driver in his vehicle in northern France's Aisne region.
French officials also reported the death of a man who fell from his balcony in the port city of Le Havre.
A man in the Dutch town of Venray, a woman in Madrid and a person in Germany were also killed.
By 1700 GMT, 325,000 French households were still without power, mainly in Brittany and Normandy, according to Enedis power networks.
The wind gusts in Brittany were "exceptional" and "many absolute records have been broken", national weather service Meteo-France said on X.
On the French Mediterranean island of Corsica, shipowner Francois-Xavier Bacchidu said the damage was "totally unheard of" as he surveyed the scene of overturned boats and damaged buildings.
"The boats here have always been safe. At least, we thought so, but we're going to have to rethink things in the future," he told AFP.
- Travel disruption -
In southern England, hundreds of schools were closed Thursday as large waves powered by winds of 135 km/h crashed along the coastline.
On the Channel Island of Jersey, residents had to be evacuated to hotels overnight as gusts of up to 164 km/h damaged homes, according to local media.
Air, rail and ferry services saw cancellations and long delays across several countries.
More than 200 flights were cancelled at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport, a major European hub.
In Spain, more than 80 flights were cancelled at 11 airports and rail services were suspended in the northwest on Thursday.
Belgium's port of Antwerp was closed and flights from Brussels were disrupted.
Scientists have warned the world will experience more extreme weather events because of the global warming caused by greenhouse gases.
"The links between climate change and winter storms in Europe are complex," said Hannah Cloke, professor of hydrology at England's Reading University.
"But as seas and air temperatures get warmer, we expect some winter storms to bring more rain, and potentially cause more flooding."
Heavy rains hit final day of royal tour in Kenya
Mombasa, Kenya (AFP) Nov 3, 2023 -
King Charles III's final day in Kenya on Friday was disrupted by heavy rains and floods as he toured the historic heart of the Indian Ocean city of Mombasa.
The inclement weather derailed plans for Charles and Queen Camilla to ride in an electric tuktuk to Fort Jesus, a 400-year-old UNESCO World Heritage site in Mombasa's Old Town.
Instead, the royal couple briefly posed for photographs inside the three-wheeler vehicle, which was decorated in a bold African pattern and a Union Jack logo.
Kenya's coast and other parts of the country have been battered by torrential rains and sometimes raging floods in recent days.
The UN's humanitarian agency, OCHA, said last month that eastern Africa would likely encounter heavier than normal rains over the October-December period because of the El Nino phenomenon.
El Nino is a naturally occurring pattern associated with increased heat worldwide, as well as drought in some parts of the world and heavy rains elsewhere.
King Charles has long been a fervent environmentalist and his programme on the four-day state visit to Kenya has focused on efforts to combat climate change, as well as support for creative arts, technology and young people.
"Left unchecked, global warming, biodiversity loss and climate change are challenges which threaten us all and can only be met by the whole of society working together in the spirit of action, partnership and commitment," he said at the UN office in Nairobi this week.
The visit to Kenya has however stirred mixed emotions in the former colony, with calls for the king to apologise for Britain's brutal crackdown on the nation's independence struggle.
At a state banquet on Tuesday, the 74-year-old monarch said the "wrongdoings of the past are a cause of the greatest sorrow and the deepest regret," but stopped short of an apology.
"There were abhorrent and unjustifiable acts of violence committed against Kenyans as they waged... a painful struggle for independence and sovereignty. And for that, there can be no excuse," he said.
At least 10,000 people -- mainly from the Kikuyu tribe -- were killed when colonial-era authorities brutally suppressed the Mau Mau uprising between 1952-1960, although some put the true figures much higher.
Tens of thousands more were rounded up and detained without trial in camps where reports of executions, torture and vicious beatings were common.
During his stay in Nairobi, the king held private talks with descendants of Dedan Kimathi and Mekatilili wa Menza -- two influential leaders of the independence struggle.
On Friday, Charles visited Mombasa's Mandhry Mosque and the Memorial Cathedral, where he joined an interfaith meeting.
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