South Africa is bracing for further heavy downpours on the east coast this weekend after last week’s torrential rain killed around 400 people and left thousands homeless.

At least 40,000 people in the KwaZulu-Natal province were left without shelter, power or water over the last week, while water services were also shut down and operations at one of Africa’s busiest ports of Durban were disrupted.

State broadcaster SABC said today that the death toll was now 398, with 27 people still missing.

Now citizens are facing further devastation as more rainfall has been forecast over the coming days.

Gloria Linda said she was “so worried” as she sheltered under a large umbrella by a muddy road near where she lived in KwaNdengezi, about 30 kilometres (20 miles) inland from the main eastern coastal city of Durban.

She added: “A lot of people’s houses are damaged, a lot of people died.

“We’ve got no water, no electricity, even our phones are dead. We’re stuck.”

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She then started to walk down a dirt track to attend a funeral of a friend who was killed by the floods.

Many relatives have been searching for missing members of their families among the wreckage, but have only found victims’ bodies.

Elsewhere, a family stood in the rain looking at their collapsed metal shack, one of several destroyed homes.

Muzi Mzobe, 59, was renting a house to tenants, but they were killed in the floods.

He said: “We phoned the police, we phoned the ambulance, we phoned fire brigade, none of them responded in time.

“Four people were covered in rubble here, and when we got them out, they had already passed on.”

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