Egypt s housing ministry spokesperson announced on Wednesday that almost 80 percent of the rainwater that flooded the streets of New Cairo, on the outskirts of the capital, has been removed.
Several areas of Cairo were hit with heavy downpour on Tuesday which buckled roads, damaged buildings, cut power and brought traffic to a standstill on major thoroughfares.
Ministry spokesperson Hani Youness said that New Cairo municipal officials brought in vacuum trucks and equipment from neighbouring governorates and cities to assist in removing what he said was an amount of water that was "unprecedented" since the eastern Cairo satellite city was built more than two decades ago.
Speaking on satellite TV s Extra News, Youness said the crisis was worsened by power outages that caused sewage lifts to fail.
"We have solved the problem by 80 or 90 percent and are now done with [water removal] in most of the areas there," he said.
Residents of New Cairo took to social media over the past two days to express their frustration at perceived inaction by officials, sharing videos and photos showing rainwater on the streets as high as 1 meter in depth, partially submerging motor vehicles.
The Egyptian cabinet s Information and Decision Support Centre (IDSC) said municipal workers have also been removing water from neighborhoods on Cairo s southern outskirts.
Egypt s General Traffic Authority said Thursday that a motorway connecting the Red Sea town of Zaafarana near Ain Sokhna to the resort town of Hurghada was reopened as pools of mud, which had blocked it for almost two days, have been removed.
Traffic on the motorway has been re-routed to a newly-inaugurated road connecting Ain Sokhna and Cairo.
Forecasts predict the rainy weather will continue into Thursday and begin improving on Friday.
Temperatures over the weekend are expected to rise by 1-3 degrees Celsius across the country, with highs of 29 and lows of 18 forecast in Cairo and the cities of the Nile Delta.
