Indonesia intensifies search for victims after floods and landslides kill 69 people

MEDAN, Indonesia (AP) – Rescuers searched Thursday 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.

The death toll rose to 37 in North Sumatra province as rescue personnel recovered more bodies on Thursday, said provincial police spokesperson Ferry Walintukan in a statement. Rescuers were searching for 52 residents reported missing, but mudslides, blackouts and a lack of telecommunications were hampering search efforts, he said.

Seventeen bodies were recovered by Thursday in South Tapanuli district and eight bodies in Sibolga city, Walintukan said. In the neighboring district of Central Tapanuli, landslides hit several homes, killing at least a family of four as well as one person found dead in floods in the city of Padang Sidempuan.

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

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

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.

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

Rescuers by Thursday 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.

The flooding in West Sumatra province submerged thousands of homes, including more than 3,300 houses in Padang Pariaman district, forcing about 12,000 residents to flee to temporary shelters, the local disaster mitigation agency said.

The agency reported at least 23 people dead and five missing in West Sumatra province as rescuers recovered more bodies on Thursday, including the bodies of six people who drowned in floods in Lumin Park, a residential area in the provincial capital of Padang.

Scores of rescue personnel searching through a river around the Anai Valley Waterfall area in Tanah Datar district where tons of mud, rocks and trees were left from flash floods, retrieved seven bodies on Thursday, including a child, Padang’s Search and Rescue Office reported.

Rescue teams and volunteers in the worst-hit Agam district recovered 10 bodies of people who were swept away by floods in Malalak village by Thursday, said Hendri, a relief coordinator who goes by a single name. He said rescuers still searching for five villagers reported missing.

Lingga Sari, a Malalak’s resident recalled the moment the flash flood struck as she was trying to put her restless child to sleep.

“Suddenly I heard a rumbling sound that kept getting louder,” said the mother of the 1-year-old boy. Stepping outside with her child in her arms, she saw neighbors gathering in panic, shouting warnings of a sudden torrent. She and others rushed toward a small prayer house at a nearby intersection, but floodwaters quickly surged in.

“We had to run again, racing through the rising water toward the rice field,” Lingga said.

Agam district chief Benny Warlis told The Associated Press that around 200 residents remain isolated in landslide-hit Jorong Taboh village on a hillside following recent landslides. Authorities have yet to confirm the number of people left homeless, dead, or missing by the devastation, as all routes to the area are cut off.

“We are facing difficulties verifying data on victims and those missing because access to the village, located on a steep hill, is completely blocked,” Warlis said.

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 flood plains.

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Karmini reported from Jakarta, Indonesia.