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Libya’s Derna Closed Off as Toll Rises and Searchers Look for 10,100 Missing

Damaged vehicles are seen at the port city of Derna, eastern Libya, 14 September 2023, in the wake of Storm Daniel and the collapse of two dams that caused devastating floods and swept away entire neighborhoods. EPA/STRINGER
Damaged vehicles are seen at the port city of Derna, eastern Libya, 14 September 2023, in the wake of Storm Daniel and the collapse of two dams that caused devastating floods and swept away entire neighborhoods. EPA/STRINGER
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Libya’s Derna Closed Off as Toll Rises and Searchers Look for 10,100 Missing

Damaged vehicles are seen at the port city of Derna, eastern Libya, 14 September 2023, in the wake of Storm Daniel and the collapse of two dams that caused devastating floods and swept away entire neighborhoods. EPA/STRINGER
Damaged vehicles are seen at the port city of Derna, eastern Libya, 14 September 2023, in the wake of Storm Daniel and the collapse of two dams that caused devastating floods and swept away entire neighborhoods. EPA/STRINGER

Libyan authorities blocked civilians from entering the flood-stricken eastern city of Derna on Friday so search teams could look through the mud and wrecked buildings for 10,100 people still missing after the known toll rose to 11,300 dead.

The disaster after two dams collapsed in heavy rains and sent a massive flood gushing into the Mediterranean city early Monday underscored the storm's intensity.

Derna was being evacuated and only search and rescue teams would be allowed to enter, Salam al-Fergany, director general of the Ambulance and Emergency Service in eastern Libya, announced late Thursday.

The Libyan Red Crescent said as of Thursday that 11,300 people in Derna had died and another 10,100 were reported missing. Mediterranean storm Daniel also killed about 170 people elsewhere in the country.

Eastern Libya’s health minister, Othman Abduljaleel, has said the burials so far were in mass graves outside Derna and nearby towns and cities.

Abduljaleel said rescue teams were searching wrecked buildings in the city center and divers were combing the sea off Derna.

Soon after the storm hit the city Sunday night, residents said they heard loud explosions when the dams outside the city collapsed. Floodwaters gushed down Wadi Derna, a valley that cuts through the city, crashing through buildings and washing people out to sea.

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Mother of Missing Journalist Austin Tice Says Trump Team Offered Help in Search 

Debra Tice, mother of journalist Austin Tice who disappeared while reporting in Syria in 2012, meets with Syria's de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, in Damascus, Syria, January 19, 2025. (Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham/Handout via Reuters)
Debra Tice, mother of journalist Austin Tice who disappeared while reporting in Syria in 2012, meets with Syria's de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, in Damascus, Syria, January 19, 2025. (Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham/Handout via Reuters)
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Mother of Missing Journalist Austin Tice Says Trump Team Offered Help in Search 

Debra Tice, mother of journalist Austin Tice who disappeared while reporting in Syria in 2012, meets with Syria's de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, in Damascus, Syria, January 19, 2025. (Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham/Handout via Reuters)
Debra Tice, mother of journalist Austin Tice who disappeared while reporting in Syria in 2012, meets with Syria's de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, in Damascus, Syria, January 19, 2025. (Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham/Handout via Reuters)

The mother of American journalist Austin Tice made her first visit to Syria in almost a decade Monday and said that the administration of President-elect Donald Trump had offered support to help find her son, who disappeared in 2012.

Debra Tice made the remarks at a news conference in Damascus in her first visit to the country since insurgents toppled President Bashar al-Assad last month. She did not present any new findings in the ongoing search.

Austin Tice disappeared near the Syrian capital in 2012, and has not been heard from since other than a video released weeks later that showed him blindfolded and held by armed men. Tens of thousands are believed to have gone missing in Syria since 2011, when countrywide protests against Assad spiraled into a devastating civil war.

Outgoing US President Joe Biden told reporters at the White House in December that he believes Washington can bring Tice back, while admitting that “we have no direct evidence” of his well-being.

“I have great hope that the Trump administration will sincerely engage in diligent work to bring Austin home.” Tice said. “His people have already reached out to me. I haven’t experienced that for the last four years.”

Syria's former government had publicly denied that it was holding him, but Tice hopes she will find him with the help of the new leadership. In December, she said the family had information from an unidentified source that her son was alive and well. She said Monday she still believes he is alive and in good health.

“Austin, if you can somehow hear this, I love you. I know you’re not giving up, and neither am I,” she said.

Tice said she had a productive meeting with Ahmad al-Sharaa, the leader of Syria’s new administration, who she said was “dedicated and determined” to bring back Austin and the others missing in the country.

She also visited two military intelligence prisons in Syria, known for their mass incarceration and systematic use of torture, which she described as an “unbelievably, horrible nightmare.”

Tice, who is from Houston, has had his work published by The Washington Post, McClatchy newspapers and other outlets.