More Residents Flee as Ukraine Floodwaters Spread After Dam Collapse

Residents scrambled to get onto rafts or climb into military vehicles as floodwaters from a collapsed dam kept rising in southern Ukraine on Wednesday.

Waters were expected to rise another three feet after Tuesday’s breach of the Kakhovka hydroelectric dam and reservoir, which is one of the largest in the world.

Some local residents spent the night on rooftops or in trees. Others, scrambling to flee the rising waters, were evacuated by buses and trains with the belongings they could carry.

The streets of the city of Kherson were covered with water on Wednesday.

More than 1,800 houses were flooded along the Dnieper.

42,000 people were at risk from flooding, the BBC reported, citing Ukranian authorities.

Residents sloshed through knee-deep waters in inundated homes as videos posted on social media showed scenes including rescue workers carrying people to safety.

Reports indicate hundreds of animals are dead in Ukraine after Tuesday's destruction of the Kakhovka dam flooded the Kazkova Dibrova Zoo.

Ukraine accused Russian forces of blowing up the dam, which sits in an area Moscow has controlled for more than a year. Russian officials blamed Ukrainian bombardment.

Amid speculation that Ukraine may have secretly started its long-anticipated counteroffensive, the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington think tank, said Russian forces may think breaching the dam could cover a possible retreat and delay Ukraine's push.

Experts noted that the dam, about 44 miles to the east of the city of Kherson, was believed to be in disrepair and vulnerable to collapse as the water was already brimming over when the wall gave way. 

The dam helps provide irrigation and drinking water to a wide swath of southern Ukraine, including the Crimean Peninsula, which was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014.

Water from the dam also provides cooling for the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, Europe’s largest nuclear power station. The Zaporizhzhia plant is roughly 100 miles from the Kahovka dam.

Both sides warned of a looming environmental disaster from polluted waters, partly caused by oil leaking from the dam’s machinery. The empty reservoir could later deprive farmland of irrigation.

Officials from Russia and Ukraine, and the U.N., have said that the damage will take days to assess and warned of a long recovery period.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.