Flash floods have hit Melut County in South Sudan’s Upper Nile State, affecting residents and internally displaced families.

Some 426,000 people, including 185,000 children, have been affected and displaced in South Sudan by heavy flooding that submerged homes and farms, the United Nations said.

“People have become homeless, the internally displaced people are in a dire humanitarian situation,” Thon Aguang, an executive director in Adar Payam, told Radio Tamazuj on Tuesday.

Torrential rains and floods hit the area of Melut in August, leaving the locals grappling with heavy flooding that destroyed properties and crops.

Last week, South Sudan’s government announced that it set up a committee to access the floods crisis across the country.

OCHA last month warned of limited supplies and a funding shortfall, saying that it had only received 54 percent of the $1.7 billion required to pay for programmes in the country.

In Melut County of Upper Nile state, neither local residents nor internally displaced families were prepared for the flooding.

“The camp for internally displaced people is flooded, and the properties have been destroyed by the floods,” said Arop Kuol, the head of Dentima IDP camp, which has been accommodating a large number of internally displaced families since 2014.

The camp head appealed for assistance before their situation deteriorates further.

“We have been displaced to the New Site area on a road which leads to Paloch town. Here, we are just in the open without food, “said Abuk Gatjang, one of the affected IDPs. “ We are now standing in water. My children have nothing to eat because it is not possible for me to cook in floodwaters.”