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Death toll to reach 1000 in India floods

Authorities warned residents to remain at home Sunday after heavy rains began falling again across Mumbai and the surrounding state, which were hammered last week by devastating floods. Also, the recovery over the weekend of more than 100 bodies pushed the official death toll to 899. On Sunday, officials said more bodies were likely to be recovered from the flood-devastated Raigad district.

Cleanup efforts and the distribution of food supplies to needy residents were badly slowed by the renewed monsoon rains, which began early Sunday morning, and aviation officials ordered the city`s airports, the busiest in the country, closed because of poor visibility. The airports reopened at around noon after a seven-hour shutdown. Officials, meanwhile, said the death toll from the recent rains could reach 1,000.

"The bodies are still coming out. There will be another 100 or so," said K. Vatsa, state rehabilitation secretary. "The toll will definitely be around 1,000."

Five days after crippling rains pounded western India ? reaching a record 37 inches (94 centimeters) in suburban Bombay ? soldiers, civil defense teams and aid workers continued to find bodies from the state`s worst-affected districts: Raigad, Ratnagiri, Thane, Parbhani, Nanded and Kolhapur. But incessant rainfall and mounds of debris, boulders and mud tangled into the wooden and tin remains of people`s homes was making it a challenge to pull out the remaining bodies.