BENGALURU (AFP) – Soaring temperatures at a hugely crowded airshow in India where organisers had hoped to break record attendance figures left at least five people dead, media reported on Monday.
Hundreds of thousands of people gathered along a beach in the blazing sun on Sunday with temperatures hitting 35 degrees Celsius at the airforce show in the southern city of Chennai in Tamil Nadu state.
The Press Trust of India news agency, quoting government officials, said Monday that five spectators had died from “heatstroke and exhaustion” during the airshow.
The Indian Express also quoted a police officer as saying five people had died in separate incidents due to “dehydration and stress”.
One eyewitness who spoke to the newspaper said the sheer numbers of people was “suffocating”, while roads were reported to be jammed with traffic and trains overcrowded.
Broadcaster NDTV reported that the Indian air force had been “aggressively” pushing the event to set a record in the Limca Book of Records, the country’s archive of records held by Indians.
But Ma Subramanian, Tamil Nadu state minister for medical and family welfare, said the authorities had provided “adequate” facilities, including medics on standby and drinking water for the crowds.
Scorching summer temperatures are common in India but years of scientific research have found climate change is causing heatwaves to become longer, more frequent and more intense.
Earlier this year, the country was gripped by brutal temperatures surging more than 50C.
Lawmaker Kanimozhi Karunanidhi, from the state’s ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam party, said reports of the deaths were “painful”.
