Rescuers in Pakistan’s Punjab province are using drones to spot people stranded on rooftops as historic floods force mass evacuations across the country’s most populous region. Authorities say more than 850,000 people and half a million farm animals have already been moved to safety in what officials are calling Punjab’s biggest flood on record.
Weeks of unusually heavy monsoon rains, combined with massive water releases from Indian dams, have pushed the Ravi, Chenab and Sutlej rivers beyond their banks, inundating farmland and submerging entire villages. In districts like Multan and Jhang, residents were seen wading chest-deep through floodwaters, carrying their belongings toward higher ground after waiting in vain for rescue boats.
“We are handling an unprecedented situation,” said Irfan Ali Kathia, head of the Punjab Disaster Management Authority. “Our priority is to save lives and ensure supplies reach survivors.” He confirmed that drones were deployed this week to accelerate rescues in Multan, Jhang and other districts.
Yet on the roadside embankments where thousands of displaced families have gathered, desperation is growing. “We have been destroyed. Everything is gone in the flood,” said Haleema Bibi, 54, who fled her damaged home in Jhang. Others described sleeping on plastic sheets without food, while some farmers stayed behind in flooded houses to protect against looters.
The Punjab government says it has opened more than 1,000 relief camps, but official figures show only about 36,000 evacuees are sheltered there, raising questions about the fate of hundreds of thousands more.
In neighboring Sindh province, officials warned of a looming “super flood” on the Indus River if water levels continue to rise. Meanwhile, India’s northern states also reeled from torrential rains. At least five people were killed in landslides in Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh, while schools were closed across Indian Punjab.
Pakistan’s monsoon season, which runs until the end of September, has already left at least 854 people dead nationwide since late June. While the current toll in Punjab — 33 deaths so far — is lower than the catastrophic floods of 2022, the scale of damage to homes, farmland and livelihoods is immense.
The crisis has also triggered rare diplomatic contact between India and Pakistan, with New Delhi officially notifying Islamabad before releasing water from swollen dams last week. But for millions in Punjab, those exchanges offer little relief as they face one of the worst natural disasters in the province’s history.