Rescuers intensify search for victims after floods and landslides kill 69 people

Rescuers searched yesterday in rivers and the rubble of villages for bodies and possible survivors after flash floods and landslides on Indonesia’s Sumatra island left 69 people dead and 59 missing.

Monsoon rains over the past week caused rivers to burst their banks in North Sumatra province Tuesday. The deluge tore through mountainside village, swept away people and submerged more than 2,000 houses and buildings, the National Disaster Management Agency said. Nearly 5,000 residents fled to government shelters.

Seventeen bodies were recovered by yesterday in South Tapanuli district and eight bodies in Sibolga city, North Sumatra provincial police’s spokesperson Ferry Walintukan said in a statement. In the neighboring district of Central Tapanuli, landslides hit several homes, killing at least a family of four.

Rescue workers also recovered two bodies in Pakpak Bharat district and were searching for five people reported missing in Humbang Hasundutan, another district devastated by landslides that killed two villagers, Walintukan said. At least one resident died when mud and debris struck a main road on a tiny Nias island, he added.

“With many missing and some remote areas still unreachable, the death toll was likely to rise,” Walintukan said.

Cloud seeding is planned

More downpours were forecast for North Sumatra province and the danger of extreme rainfall will continue until next week, Indonesia’s Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency said.

It recommended weather modification to reduce rain, and disaster agency chief Suharyanto said cloud seeding would be done to prevent further rainfall and floods.

“We are deploying weather modification technology starting tomorrow so that rain does not fall during this emergency response period,” Suharyanto, who goes by a single name like many Indonesians, told reporters before visiting flood- and landslide-hit areas of Sibolga city yesterday.

Cloud seeding involves dispersing particles into clouds to create precipitation, which would be done to redirect rainfall away from areas where search and rescue efforts were continuing.

Television reports showed rescue personnel using jackhammers, circular saws, farm tools and sometimes their bare hands to dig in areas marked by thick mud, rocks and uprooted trees. Rescuers in rubber boats were searching through a river and helped children and older people who were forced onto the roofs of flooded homes and buildings.

Deadly floods hit other provinces

Floods were also occurring elsewhere in the vast archipelago, including in Aceh and West Sumatra, where hundreds of houses were flooded, many up to roofs, the disaster agency said.

Rescuers by yesterday recovered at least nine bodies after landslides triggered by torrential rains struck three villages in Central Aceh on Wednesday, said the district chief Halili Yoga, who called on the local disaster agency to deploy and excavator to pull out at least two people buried under mud.

Aceh’s Disaster Mitigation Agency said nearly 47,000 people were displaced by floods in the province, forcing about 1,500 residents to flee to temporary shelters.

In West Sumatra province, rescue teams pulled six bodies of people who drowned in floods in Lumin Park residential area in the provincial capital of Padang, the local disaster agency reported. The flooding submerged more than 3,300 houses in Padang Pariaman district.

The local agency said rescuers were searching for 14 people believed to be buried under mud and rocks that hit hilly Jorong Toboh village, while landslides also cut off bridges and blocked main roads, isolating some residents.

Heavy seasonal rain from about October to March frequently causes flooding and landslides in Indonesia, an archipelago of 17,000 islands where millions of people live in mountainous areas or near fertile floodplains. NINIEK KARMINI & BINSAR BAKKARA, MEDAN, MDT/AP