'More and more water is coming every hour' - people flee as Kakhovka dam bursts

A major catastrophe has been declared in southern Ukraine after a major dam in the Kherson region was breached. President Volodymyr Zelensky said nearly 100 towns and villages are under water with thousands of people being evacuated as a result. Ukraine and Russia are accusing each other of being saboteurs, but once again civilians are facing immediate consequences.

"This is a huge ecological catastrophe," Ukrainian MP Oleksiy Goncharenko told the BBC, adding that more than 150 tonnes of engine oil from the dam near the town of Nova Kakhovka is contaminating the water.

"Maybe more will come," he says. "The consequences will last decades."

Mr Goncharenko warned that tens of thousands of lives are at risk on both sides of the River Dnipro - including in the Russian occupied region of Ukraine to the south and in the city of Kherson to the north which was regained by Ukraine back in November.

"We see with our own eyes the level of water is increasing," he adds. "Also we can see the water is moving really quickly. To destroy the bridge with such awful consequences is just so barbaric."

Videos on social media show water gushing through the breach near the dam in the town of Nova Kakhovka.

"Flood waters are coming," Andriy Kostin, prosecutor general of Ukraine told the BBC. "We expect the maximum will come in several hours."

He said 17,000 people have already been evacuated as he warned over 40,000 people are in danger of being flooded.

Hanna Zarudnia, 65, was one of those evacuated from the village of Antonivka - which is just north of the banks of the River Dnipro.

"Our local school and stadium downtown were flooded, the stadium was completely under water and the floodwaters were reaching the school," she told Reuters.

"The road was completely flooded, the bus was stuck. Only one elevated point could be reached by the bus and this is where we were taken from."

Another Kherson resident, Olga, said she was woken up at 08:00 local time by messages that houses were flooded and the evacuation was under way.

She says she has packed her suitcase and has prepared everything she needs but she has four cats and two dogs and doesn't know how she'll take all of them with her.

"I'm 62 and my whole life I've lived here. My kids had to leave, and I stayed... I don't want to leave this place," she told BBC Radio 5 live.

On the southern banks of the River Dnipro one official in the Russian-occupied province of Kherson said the town of Oleshky has been "completely flooded".

"Evacuation... is possible only using special equipment," Andrei Alexeyenko said on Telegram.

He also posted videos showing one car standing in floodwaters up to window level and a lorry driving along a highway in water at least a foot (30 cm) deep.

Russian soldiers were patrolling the streets, several local people told Reuters.

"Getting close, and especially taking a photo or video, is deadly. They say they are ready to shoot without warning," said one local man, Hlib.

Yevheniya, another resident, said the water was up to the knees of Russian soldiers walking the main street in high rubber boots.

"If you try to go somewhere they don't allow, they immediately point their machine guns at you," she said.

"More and more water is coming every hour, it's very dirty."

Elsewhere, a local Ukrainian politician in the Mykolaiv region, just north of the Nova Kakovka dam, told the BBC he expects to receive a large number of refugees fleeing flooding in the coming days.

Oleh Pylypenko, the head of the Shevchenkivka United Territorial Community, said: "We have an aid point for refugees, where they are provided with food, medicine, clothing and psychological assistance."

He said civilians would then be taken to temporary accommodation elsewhere in the Mykolaiv region by bus.

On Tuesday in an address to the Bucharest Nine - a summit which brings together nations on Nato's eastern border - President Volodymyr Zelensky detailed the immediate affects of the floods.

He said: "At least 100,000 people lived in these areas before the Russian invasion.

"At least tens of thousands are still there. Eighty towns and villages are under water."

President Zelensky, who claimed back in October that Russia was plotting to blow up the Kakhovka dam, warned the evacuations are just the initial consequences.

It may take some time for questions over who breached the dam to be answered as much of the evidence is also under water.

But Nato general secretary Jens Stoltenberg is clear civilians on both sides of the war will have to deal with the consequences of the flooding threats.

He tweeted: "The destruction of the Kakhovskaya Dam today puts thousands of civilians at risk and causes serious damage to the environment.

"This is an outrageous act that once again demonstrates the cruelty of Russia's war in Ukraine ."