Cyclone Lashes Oman and Iran, Kills At Least Nine

By Staff, Agencies

At least nine people were killed in Oman and Iran on Sunday as Tropical Cyclone Shaheen pummeled parts of their coastlines, authorities said.

In Oman, two people died in a landslide and a child in flash flooding, officials said.

Rescue teams pulled the bodies of two Asian workers from their home hit by a landslide in the Rusayl industrial area of Muscat province, Oman's National Committee for Emergency Management said.

The child died and another person was reported missing in flash floods in the capital's province, it added.

Flights were suspended and schools closed as the storm, with wind speeds up to 139 kilometers an hour, was due to cross Oman's north coast in the evening.

In the capital, Muscat, vehicles were tire-deep in water and streets deserted.

Across the sea in Iran, six people were killed in Chabahar port in the southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchestan, parliament's news agency ICANA reported, citing deputy speaker Ali Nikzad.

"Infrastructure, including electrical facilities and roads, was damaged," provincial governor Hossein Modarres-Khiabani told Iran's official IRNA news agency.

The eye of the storm was 220 kilometers off the coast of the province, he said.

The United Arab Emirates [UAE] was also on "high alert", emergency services said.

Some flights to and from Muscat International Airport were suspended "to avoid any risks", the airport said, while the Civil Aviation Authority urged people to avoid low-lying areas and valleys.

Oman declared a two-day national holiday on Sunday and Monday and shuttered schools "due to the adverse climate conditions", the official Oman News Agency said.