Preliminary flood damages released

Some 1700 homes have been destroyed by massive flooding in Colorado according to preliminary damage assessments.

Last weeks torrential downpours inundated the normal semi-arid land with unrelenting rain.

Towns in the foothills of the Rockies were drenched prompting large scale evacuation operations and sending thousands of residents into emergency shelters. At least eight people have died in the floods.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency says more than 6,400 affected residents have already applied for federal disaster assistance.

The National Weather Service called the rainstorm the most sustained and intense to hit the region in four decades.