Amazon climate crisis continues with Acre floods and Roraima fires

A series of floods hit the northern Brazilian state of Acre in late February and early March, leaving four people dead and thousands without power or running water. During the same period, the state of Roraima, close to Brazil’s border with Venezuela, saw a record number of forest fires.

Acre is deep in Brazil’s Amazon, bordering both Peru and Bolivia, and has a population of less than a million. As of Wednesday, over 140 residents of the state capital Rio Branco were still without electricity at home.

On March 6, the Acre River in the city reached the second-highest mark ever recorded: 17.89 meters, close to six stories tall. According to the Rio Branco city hall, over 1,000 families moved to shelters set up by city officials. Others also displaced might have moved to homes of relatives and friends, or left the city. By the middle of the week, only about 200 of the sheltered familiares had returned home.

According to the Acre state government, there were over 10,000 people in shelters and 18,500 displaced statewide earlier last week.

As the river subsides, the destruction of the flood continues. The erosion led to the collapse of the river banks and of buildings in its vicinity. On Thursday, three houses and a car workshop were swallowed up by the river, and four cars were swept away by the mudslide.

On March 4, Regional Development Minister Waldez Góes visited the state alongside Environment Minister Marina Silva, who was born in Acre. 

The federal government authorized a total BRL 18.6 million (USD 3.7 million) for emergency...