UAE floods: How much money will the country need to rebuild infrastructure?

On 15 April, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) experienced its heaviest downpour in 75 years, receiving up to 259.5 mm (10.2 inches) of rain. Dubai was badly hit. The rains killed at least one person, caused damage to homes and businesses, disrupted air travel and brought the financial city to a standstill.

As per UAE’s Wam news agency, the rain was “a historic weather event” that surpassed “anything documented since the start of data collection in 1949” – that was before the UAE was established in 1971.

Now normalcy is slowly returning and as UAE picks up the pieces, Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan has ordered an urgent review of the country’s infrastructure. The president has ordered authorities to quickly work on studying the condition of infrastructure throughout the UAE, reported Wam news agency.

But how much will it cost to repair? Let’s take a closer look.

The money needed to rebuild

The United Arab Emirates announced $544 million (Rs 4,535 crore) to repair the homes of Emirati families on 24 April, after last week’s record rain caused widespread flooding and brought the oil-rich Gulf state to a standstill.

“We learnt great lessons in dealing with severe rain ,” said Prime Minister Mohammed Rashid al-Maktoum after a Cabinet meeting, adding that ministers approved “two billion dirhams to deal with damage to the homes of citizens”.

The announcement comes more than a week after the unprecedented deluge lashed the desert country, turning streets into rivers and hobbling Dubai’s airport, the world’s busiest for international passengers.

“A ministerial committee was assigned to follow up on this file… and disburse compensation in cooperation with the rest of the federal and local authorities,” said Sheikh Mohammed, who is also the ruler of Dubai, which was one of the worst hit of the UAE’s seven sheikhdoms.

The rainfall, the UAE’s heaviest since records began 75 years ago , killed at least four people, including three Filipino workers and one Emirati. The UAE authorities have not released an official toll.

Cabinet ministers also formed a second committee to log infrastructure damage and propose solutions, Sheikh Mohammed said in a post on social media platform X.

“The situation was unprecedented in its severity but we are a country that learns from every experience,” he said.

Hopes to avoid such events

Climatologist Friederike Otto, a specialist in assessing the role of global warming on extreme weather events, told AFP it was “high likely” that the rainfall “was made heavier by human-caused climate change”.

The storm first landed in Oman on 14 April, where it killed at least 21 people, according to the official Oman News Agency.

It then battered the UAE, dumping up to two years’ worth of rain on the federal monarchy with a 90 per cent expatriate population before subsiding on 17 April.

But the glam hub of Dubai, touted as a picture-perfect city, faced severe disruption for days later, with waterlogged roads and flooded homes.

Dubai airport cancelled 2,155 flights, diverted 115 and did not return to full capacity until 23 April.

“We must acknowledge… that there has been an unreasonable and unacceptable deficiency and collapse in services and crisis management,” prominent Emirati analyst Abdulkhaleq Abdulla said on X.

“We hope that this will not be repeated in the future,” he added, in a rare public rebuke.

Dubai on the path of recovery

Dubai is now mostly back to its normal pace, with public transport fully functioning and all major roads open to traffic.

But for Matthew Faddy, a 56-year-old Brit who lives in the UAE’s business hub, total recovery is still days away.

His ground-floor apartment near a lake was flooded last week, with the water breaching a half-metre wall in his garden.

“Finally, the water has come down substantially but it (was) only really yesterday that it started to come down,” he told AFP on 24 April.

“At its worst, the water was nearly chest-high in the apartment and now, from what I can see… it’s probably below the knee, at shin height,” said Faddy, a music composer and sound designer.

“I think it will probably be another week before the water is gone.”

With inputs from AFP