Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Mass graves filling up in quake-hit Indonesia
Hungry survivors mobbing rescuers
PALU, Indonesia — As officials began burying hundreds of dead in a mass grave Monday, thousands of survivors of a devastating earthquake and tsunami converged on the airport of this heavily damaged Indonesian city and clamored to leave, saying there was little to eat and their homes were unsafe.
Frantic rescue efforts were hampered by limited heavy equipment, and police were busy dealing with looters. While President Joko Widodo said he welcomed international aid, none had yet reached the disaster zone. At the site of some collapsed buildings, workers were forced to work by hand, pulling away chunks of rubble.
The confirmed death toll of 844, mostly from the city of Palu, is expected to rise as authorities reach areas that were cut off by the disaster. An unofficial count by volunteers, nongovernmental groups and hospitals put the death toll over 1,200. The magnitude-7.5 earthquake struck at dusk Friday and generated a tsunami said to have been as high as 20 feet in places.
“The smell of death is strong in the air,” said Radika Pinto, area manager for World Vision, an international Christian aid organization. “I’m afraid the death toll is going to continue to rise dramatically.”
Search-and-rescue teams combed destroyed homes and buildings, including a collapsed eight-story hotel, for any trapped survivors, but they needed more heavy equipment to clear the rubble.
Many people were believed trapped under shattered houses in Palu’s Balaroa neighborhood, where the earthquake caused the ground to heave up and down violently, said disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho.
In the city’s Petobo section, the quake caused loose, wet soil to liquefy, creating a thick, heavy mud that caused major damage. “In Petobo, it is estimated that there are still hundreds of victims buried in mud,” Nugroho said.
Residents who found loved ones — alive and dead — over the weekend expressed frustration that it took rescue teams until Monday to reach Petobo.
Desperation was evident across Palu, a city of more than 380,000 people on the island of Sulawesi.
About 3,000 residents flocked to its airport, trying to board military aircraft or one of the few commercial flights, local TV reported. Video showed some of them screaming in anger because they were not able to get on a departing military plane.
“We have not eaten for three days!” one woman yelled. “We just want to be safe!”
The rush on the runway was so frenzied that an Indonesian air force plane filled with relief supplies was unable to land. The airport, hampered by a damaged control tower and cracked runway, was briefly closed.
Nearly 50,000 people have been displaced from their homes in Palu alone, Nugroho said, and hospitals were overwhelmed.
The Indonesian air force confirmed that a Hercules aircraft carrying an unspecified number of survivors was able to leave Palu for South Sulawesi’s capital, Makassar.
Widodo authorized the acceptance of international help, Nugroho said, adding that generators, heavy equipment and tents were among the most-needed items. The European Union and 10 countries have offered assistance, including the United States, Australia and China, he said.
“We will send food today, as much as possible with several aircraft,” Widodo told reporters in the capital, Jakarta, adding that a supply of fuel was also set to arrive.
In previous instances, local authorities had said they could handle the relief efforts themselves and turned away offers of overseas assistance, prompting much criticism.
President Donald Trump sent his “warmest condolences” to the country and told reporters during a Rose Garden news conference that he has dispatched first responders, the military and others to help in the aftermath of the disaster, which he called “a really bad, bad situation.”
Hundreds of people were lined up for fuel at gas stations across Palu, with waiting cars snarling traffic amid neighborhoods with fences painted with the red and white colors of the Indonesian flag.
Groups of children, some smiling but others with anxious expressions, stood in the middle of roads holding boxes for cash donations. Signs were displayed along roads, saying “We need Food” and “We need support.” Another asked about the whereabouts of their local political leader.
Residents walked dazed through town, clambering over fractured roads to search for missing family members. Others steeled themselves for a trip to the police hospital, part of which has been turned into a makeshift morgue.
On the road into Palu, supplicants stopped cars, pleading for anything: fuel, food, water. At least two aid vehicles were besieged by mobs.
SEARCH FOR SURVIVORS
Three days after the powerful waves struck, the coastline at Palu remained strewn with rubble and a few brightly colored cargo containers poking out of the water. Those buildings that still stood near the water were ruined shells.
Rescuers searching a collapsed building Monday night were able to remove 38-yearold Sapri Nusin alive from the rubble.
Indonesian TV showed a conscious Nusin talking to his rescuers from the National Search and Rescue Agency as they worked by flashlight. He was carried away on a stretcher, although his condition was not known.
Two bodies were found under the downed hotel, which has been a focus of the efforts, on Monday, Rafiq Ashori, the Indonesian Red Cross disaster preparedness head, said by phone from Palu.
Elsewhere in Palu, Edi Setiawan said he and fellow residents rescued five children and four adults, including a pregnant woman. His sister and father, however, did not survive.
“My sister was found embracing her father,” he said. “My mother was able to survive after struggling against the mud and being rescued by villagers.”
The official death toll of 844 was released by Nugroho on Monday, an increase of only 12 from the previous day, with nearly all from Palu. The regencies of Donggala, Sigi and Parigi Moutong — with a combined population of 1.2 million — had yet to be fully assessed.
A team from the Indonesian Red Cross discovered the bodies of 36 people in Sigi, just south of Palu, on Monday. These fatalities do not appear to have been included in the government’s official count, so they would add to it.
In Donggala hundreds of residents huddled in makeshift camps by the roadside on Monday, either because their homes were damaged or for fear of aftershocks.
“The situation in the affected areas is nightmarish,” said Jan Gelfand, head of the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, citing the dire lack of food, water and shelter for survivors.
In this stiflingly hot city just south of the equator, authorities tried to dispose of bodies quickly, burying them in a mass grave after first taking DNA samples so that identities can be confirmed later.
Officials dug a trench 33 feet by 330 feet in Palu and began laying the dead in brightly colored body bags side by side.
Local army commander Tiopan Aritonang said 545 bodies would be taken to the grave from one hospital alone.
The trench can be enlarged if needed, said Willem Rampangilei, chief of Indonesia’s National Disaster Mitigation Agency.
The burials would reduce the risk of cholera and other illnesses spreading, officials said, and were in line with Muslim custom, which requires burials soon after death.
Local military spokesman Mohammad Thorir said the area adjacent to a public cemetery can hold 1,000 bodies. All of the victims, coming from hospitals, have been photographed to help families locate where their relatives were buried.
Video showed residents walking from body bag to body bag, opening the tops to check if they could identify faces.
Around midday, teams of workers, their mouths covered by masks, carried 18 bodies to the trench as a backhoe waited to push soil on top of the dead. More burials were expected to follow.
Information for this article was contributed by Niniek Karmini, Margie Mason, Todd Pitman, Ali Kotarumalos and Chris Nusatya of The Associated Press; by Adam Dean, Hannah Beech and Richard C. Paddock of The New York Times; and by Simon Roughneen and Shashank Bengali of the Los Angeles Times.