The World : Mexican City Floods Kill 4

Thirteen hours of heavy rain left four people dead and 500 homeless in Monterrey, Mexico, the Red Cross reported. Officials declared a state of emergency in the northern industrial city, which has a metropolitan area population of 2.8 million. “The situation is very grave,” said Red Cross Cmdr. Andres Castillo Perez, with flood waters more than four feet deep in some areas. Castillo said four men were swept to their deaths when a normally dry drainage channel overflowed. Monterrey is usually so arid that in recent years poor people had built tiny, concrete-block houses on the floor and banks of the channel.