ROSTOV-ON-DON. June 7 (Interfax) - Rescuers and members of the Novaya Kakhovka administration are looking for at least seven people missing in the areas flooded after the Kakhovka Hydropower Plant infrastructure was destroyed, urban district administration head Vladimir Leontyev told reporters.
"We are verifying information about the missing people but, according to preliminary reports, these people have been evacuated from areas that ceased to exist after flooding - the island. Those were shepherds. [...] We know for a fact there were up to seven of them," Leontyev said.
Members of the operational headquarters are searching the area in boats, as the water level downstream of Novaya Kakhovka remains "considerable," he said.
The water level is lowering inside Novaya Kakhovka: it is down by 35 centimeters. About 900 people have been evacuated from the flooded territories over the day, and 17 people have been removed from roofs. Damage is being assessed.
A Ukrainian attack destroyed valves of the Kakhovka HPP in the early hours of June 6 and other surface infrastructure was ruined later, causing an uncontrolled discharge of Dnieper water downstream from the Kakhovka reservoir in the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions.
Water levels rose to 12 meters in the riverside communities of the Kherson region. The authorities organized evacuation and declared a state of emergency in Novaya Kakhovka. Water is expected to recede within three days.