Jemblung (Indonesia): Rescuers searching for more than 80 people missing after a landslide in Indonesia deployed bulldozers and excavators today to battle their way through roads strewn with debris to the site of the disaster, officials said.
At least 26 people have been confirmed dead after torrential downpours triggered the landslide hitting Jemblung village in central Java late Friday, National Disaster Management Agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said. “We found six more bodies on Sunday.
Eighty-two people are still missing,” he told AFP. Hundreds of rescuers were digging through the mud with shovels and their bare hands in a desperate hunt for any survivors. “I am very worried,” a sobbing Sutinem, whose 12 family members including her children were buried in the landslide, he said.
The 45-year-old, who like many Indonesians goes by only one name, said so far only the body of her mother had been found.
She was not at the village when the landslide hit as she was working in west Java.
“I was shocked to see that my village was flattened to the ground… I pray that the government will find them quickly,” she said. “We are trying our best to look (for) those still buried.
It’s a big challenge because we are still using manual tools and the affected area is very muddy,” military official Edi Rahmatullah told reporters.
Provincial search and rescue agency chief Agus Haryono said rescue efforts have been slow because the ground was still unstable. “The affected area is a large valley surrounded by hills. The soil is loose and muddy so we have to be very careful when digging to prevent more landslides,” he said, adding that sniffer dogs were being deployed to detect bodies.
“The chances of finding anyone alive at this point is slim, but who knows? We just hope and pray that we can find survivors,” he said. Authorities were using heavy equipment to clear a three-metre high pile of fallen trees and rubble on the main road leading to the site of the disaster. (AFP)