AKIPRESS.COM - At least 18 people, mainly schoolchildren and teachers, were killed on Thursday by a flash flood during a school outing near Jordan’s Dead Sea in one of the worst disasters in the kingdom in years, rescuers and hospital workers said, Reuters reports.

Thirty-four people were rescued in a major operation involving police helicopters and hundreds of army troops, police chief Brigadier General Farid al Sharaa told state television. Some of those rescued were in a serious condition.

Many of those killed were children under 14. A number of families picnicking in the popular destination were also among the dead and injured, rescuers said, without giving a breakdown of numbers.

Hundreds of families and relatives converged on Shounah hospital a few kilometers (miles) from the resort area. Relatives sobbed and searched for details about the missing children, a witness said.

The flooding occurred after heavy rainfall, the first such rains after the end of the summer season.