Dubai under a cloud of suspicion

As the torrential rain lashed down, Dubai residents peered out of skyscraper windows in disbelief at waist deep flooding. Then the airport shut. But what really caused it?

As the torrential rain lashed down on Tuesday, Dubai residents peered out of skyscraper windows in disbelief. Below, streets were flooding. The metro was closed. Then the airport shut.

For holidaymakers it was all the more bizarre. They had flown to the desert for one thing - sunshine. But it was in short supply. At luxury resorts, guests were ushered inside. “It’s not normally like this,” one hotel porter was overheard saying. “This is Dubai, it never really rains here.”

The emirate has been lashed with more than 14cm of rain, as much as normally falls in 18 months. The death toll hit 20 yesterday (Tuesday) when rescuers in Oman said they found the body of a girl in Saham. The dead include ten pupils swept away in a vehicle with an adult.

Mall of the Emirates right now 🙃 pic.twitter.com/hVMFZbY7gG

— frost (@2frost2furious) April 16, 2024

Dubai’s airport, one of the world’s busiest hubs, said it was facing “very challenging conditions”. It advised passengers to stay away as runways were flooded with water. The downpour left streets and homes waist-deep in water, and some schools closed. Social media showed cars stranded and one resident jet skiing as the country’s infrastructure struggled to deal with the deluge.

Emirati news agency WAM said one part of the country saw a record 25cm of rain - a year and a half’s worth in a single day, the heaviest recorded in 75 years - and called it “a historic weather event” which surpassed “anything documented since the start of data collection in 1949”.

A man wades through a flooded street in Dubai. Picture: Atif Bhatti/ESN/AFP

Passengers complained about the lack of information from airlines. Paul Lidwith, 40, a solicitor from St Helens, Merseyside, said he was stranded for seven hours “without a single update”. He was travelling on Emirates from New Zealand to Manchester via Sydney and Dubai. However, his flight was diverted to Al Maktoum international airport, an hour away.

Watch: Dubai airport’s tarmac is flooded after heavy thunderstorms and rain showers batter parts of the UAE. Torrential rains have caused several flight cancelations and travel delays across the country.#Dubai#UAE

Read more: https://t.co/tXGezvhlmJpic.twitter.com/W4Eo5qvYsu

— Al Arabiya English (@AlArabiya_Eng) April 16, 2024

Lidwith said he had not been given food, and staff had not provided information. He added: “This airport is for cargo planes and deals with maybe half a dozen flights a day. They couldn’t handle the flights that were diverted from Dubai. We had to wait on the tarmac for nearly five hours. It took our journey time from leaving Sydney to getting off the plane here to 22 hours. It’s just been an absolute disaster.”

Motorists drive along a flooded street following heavy rains. Picture: Giuseppe Cacace/AFP

“It’s not what we expected when we booked,” another Briton said. “We thought of April sunshine. Wine, albeit expensive, by the pool. Instead we arrived to flooding in the streets and hotel staff looking like they’d seen a ghost.”

The United Arab Emirates and other Gulf countries have had more rainfall in recent years, and storms had clogged some of Dubai’s streets earlier this year. There was speculation the storm was caused by climate change and the country’s practice of cloud seeding, where chemicals are released in the air to condense water into clouds. UAE officials denied this was responsible.

A car is left on a flooded street. Picture: Giuseppe Cacace/AFP

Passengers travelling to Dubai yesterday (Tuesday) were warned to expect significant disruption. At least 23 flights were due to leave UK airports yesterday (Tuesday), representing more than 10,000 seats, according to Cirium, the aviation analysts.

Paul Griffiths, Dubai airport’s chief executive, told a local radio station it was an “incredibly challenging” time.

my rolls royce got flooded and we’re stuck in the middle of the road in dubai 🙃 pic.twitter.com/3A9BPjusua

— Jordan Welch (@jrdnwelch) April 16, 2024

“In living memory, I don’t think anyone has ever seen conditions like it,” he said. “We are in uncharted territory, but we are working hard ... to make sure our customers and staff are looked after.”