Floods: Sandakan and Paitan hit, 180 evacuated

KOTA KINABALU: The number of flood victims at temporary evacuation centres in Sabah's eastern Sandakan and northern Paitan rose slightly overnight to 180.

In a statement, the state disaster management committee said that there are 180 people at the four relief centres opened since flooding hit the state on Tuesday (Dec 26) afternoon and added that this is an increase from the original 148.

A total of 36 families had been placed in relief centres in Sandakan while 27 people had been evacuated to a relief centre in the north eastern Paitan sub-district.

Paitan was officially declared flood-hit as of 2pm Tuesday (Dec 26) while Sandakan was declared flood-hit at 3.45pm.