The Washington Post | See the scale of Pakistan’s flooding in maps, photos and videos

“Apocalyptic.”

“Unprecedented.”

“A monsoon on steroids.”

Officials have struggled to put into words the scale of the flooding that has destroyed large parts of Pakistan. More than 1,000 people have died, and tens of millions more have been affected by months of incessant rain.

Maxar Technologies released satellite images of the city of Rojhan, in the state of Punjab, before and during the floods that showed entire communities cut off.

As Pakistan grapples with the loss of housing and farmlands as well as the risk of disease, many fear the country’s humanitarian disaster is only beginning.

Exceptional rainfall began across Pakistan in June after months of historic heat waves and little precipitation.

The ground was dry and loose from record heat, causing landslides across the country. Melting glaciers triggered floods.

Rainfall picked up even more as monsoon season began in July, which became the wettest on record since 1961, according to the Pakistan Meteorological Department.

Pakistan has had eight rounds of widespread rain this monsoon season, about double the normal amount. The country has experienced 190 percent more rainfall than average from the beginning of June to the end of August. As the Indus River swelled from the steady precipitation and glaciers melted, low-lying areas were devastated.

The last two weeks brought even more rainfall to Pakistan’s southern region.

“Rains have been going on in my village for the last two months,” said Zahid Ali Jalalani, a 35-year-old farmer in the Khairpur district of Sindh, who spoke to The Washington Post by phone. After a canal burst last week, his village flooded overnight, with water levels rising to 10 feet in some areas. Across the south, families waded through high water in search of dry land.

“It was the most terrible night of my life,” he said. “My house is well built, but at one time it seemed as if the walls were shaking.”

The extreme flooding has killed more than 1,160 people, many of them children, according to the Pakistani government.

Jalalani emerged from his home to the sound of cries for help, he recalled. He said he spent more than six hours saving people who were trapped by the water, which had risen past their shoulders. He knew one man who drowned.

“He was under a pile of rubble, and we couldn’t pull him out,” Jalalani said. “It was so dark.”

Hundreds of people from his village are in a makeshift camp, while there are nearly 500,000 people in displacement camps across the country.

Thousands more who have fled their homes in Sindh are still struggling to find care. Many walked for days in search of shelter and set up tents along the province’s main highway. Others have moved into abandoned buildings.

$10 billion to rebuild

The destruction has left parts of the country unable to function. Officials said Tuesday that 1 million houses have been destroyed, as well as 2,100 miles of road — about the distance between D.C. and Salt Lake City. Bridges and dams were also ruined. Pakistani Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal said Monday that more than $10 billion was needed to rebuild.

Thousands of acres of farmland are underwater, and aid workers are struggling to reach isolated communities.

“What lies ahead is food shortages affecting villages and cities alike,” Khan said.

Sindh’s agricultural economy “has totally collapsed,” Iqbal said at a news conference Tuesday. “Almost half of our cotton crop is destroyed,” he said. Rice has also been damaged, and 700,000 livestock have been lost across the country. He called the flooding a “climate disaster” and said Pakistan, one of the world’s lowest emitters of carbon dioxide per capita, was suffering the heaviest consequences of climate change.

“Someone is paying the price in the developing world,” Iqbal said.

Villagers in Dera Murad Jamali, Pakistan faced hardship on Aug. 28, as most of their belongings and sources of income washed away in recent flooding. (Video: Associated Press)”