The flooded housewives of Dubai: Chanel underwater, supercars swept away and mega-basements submerged. CAROLINE STANBURY tells how all the money in the world could not save the influencer set from apocalyptic rain [Video]

12:06 EDT 21 Apr 2024, updated 13:18 EDT 21 Apr 2024

Dubai is the glitzy desert city state famous for its endless sunshine, as well as the influencers, footballers and reality TV stars who flock there to lounge in luxury hotels and upload photographs onto their social media accounts.

So few anticipated the apocalyptic storms last Tuesday when a year’s worth of rain fell in 12 hours flat.

Caroline Stanbury, privately-educated British socialite turned star of the Real Housewives of Dubai reality show, certainly didn’t.

‘Nobody understood what was about to happen,’ she tells me. ‘We were oblivious. I had a dinner party planned for 15 people that night and everybody was, like, ‘we’re still coming’, but you couldn’t get down the road.

‘When you see the water flowing like [water from] taps into all the luxury shops – Chanel, Dior all of them are affected – and the cars, sports cars, floating down the streets, you realise how …