KUALA LUMPUR — At least five people were killed, and thousands were forced to evacuate across two Malaysian states on Borneo after days of heavy rain triggered floods and landslides.
Government data showed more than 700 millimetres (27.6 inches) of rain fell on parts of Sabah and Sarawak, where Petroliam Nasional Bhdoperates an LNG plant. The Malaysian Meteorological Department warned that the rains will continue until Friday.
The area around Bintulu in Sarawak, which houses a Petronas nine-train LNG complex with a capacity of nearly 30 million metric tons per year, is among the hardest-hit in terms of rainfall, according to data from the Department of Irrigation and Drainage.
State-owned Petronas said operations at the plant remain uninterrupted following the severe flooding, and that it will continue monitoring the situation closely.
More than 5,000 residents have been evacuated from their homes as of Thursday morning, according to local news reports, which called it the “worst floods in recent years.” Images and videos circulating on social media, showed entire neighborhoods submerged in muddy water and people swept away by currents or stranded on rooftops. Bloomberg could not independently verify the footage.
Bintulu received nearly 31.5 inches of rain in the last 48 hours, Jason Nicholls, a meteorologist with commercial forecaster AccuWeather Inc, said late Wednesday. The region has been pounded by heavy rain for weeks, which has left the ground saturated.
“While it isn’t unusual to get showers and thunderstorms, it is the magnitude of them and the persistence of them that is a little more than we would expect,” Nicholls said in an interview. “The rain doesn’t have anywhere to go because the ground is saturated.”
The immediate forecast shows little let up from the storms, although their intensity may subside, he added.
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