Indonesian rescuers scramble to reach isolated towns; death toll tops 400

LABUAN/SUMUR, Indonesia (AFP/ Reuters/AP) — Indonesian search and rescue teams Wednesday plucked stranded residents from remote islands and pushed into isolated communities desperate for aid in the aftermath of a volcano-triggered tsunami that killed at least 429 people.

But torrential rains hampered their efforts and heaped more misery on the region as stunned residents waded through waist-deep water in parts of hard-hit Carita.

''Heavy rains caused a river to

overflow and several places are flooded,'' national disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said on Twitter.

''It's hampering efforts to evacuate people and help other survivors.''

The disaster agency cautioned residents to stay clear of the coast as activity was still high at the rumbling Anak Krakatoa volcano, which sits in the middle of the Sunda Strait between Java and Sumatra islands.

Rescuers used drones and sniffer dogs to search for survivors along the devastated west coast of Java.

Thick ash clouds continued to spew from Anak Krakatau, a volcanic island where a crater collapse at high tide on Saturday sent waves smashing into coastal areas on both sides of the Sunda Strait between the islands of Sumatra and Java.

At least 154 people are still missing. More than 1,400 people were injured and thousands of residents had to move to higher ground, with a high-tide warning extended to Wednesday.

Indonesian authorities asked people near an island volcano to avoid the coast while eruption and weather and sea conditions were being monitored for tsunami risks.

Rescuers used heavy machinery, sniffer dogs and special cameras to detect and dig bodies out of mud and wreckage along a 100km stretch of Java’s west coast and officials said the search area would be expanded further south, following the discovery of washed away bodies.

“There are several locations that we previously thought were not affected,” said Yusuf Latif, spokesman for the national search and rescue agency.

“But now we are reaching more remote areas...and in fact there are many victims there,” he added.

Authorities said rescuers were working around the clock to reach six villages, currently inaccessible by road and where waves from the tsunami were believed to be as high as five meters.

The vast archipelago, which sits on the Pacific “Ring of Fire,” has suffered its worst annual death toll from disasters in more than a decade.

Earthquakes flattened parts of the island of Lombok in July and August, and a double quake-and-tsunami in September killed more than 2,000 people on a remote part of Sulawesi island.

It took only 24 minutes after the landslide for waves to hit land, and there was no early warning for those living on the coast.

A tsunami that followed an eruption of Anak Krakatoa hit communities along the Sunda Strait on Saturday night, killing more than 420 people and displacing thousands. The eruption is believed to have set off a landslide on the volcano’s slopes, displacing the water that then slammed into Java and Sumatra islands.

Indonesia’s Meteorology, Geophysics and Climatology Agency asked people late Tuesday to stay at least 500 meters from the Sunda Strait coastline.

Agency’s head Dwikorita Karnawati said government agencies were monitoring Anak Krakatoa’s eruptions and that high waves and heavy rain were possible Wednesday.

“All these conditions could potentially cause landslides at the cliffs of the crater into the sea, and we fear that that could trigger a tsunami,” she said at a news conference. She asked that communities remain vigilant but not panic.

More than 16,000 people were displaced from their homes and heavy equipment was urgently needed in the Sumur subdistrict near Ujung Kulon National Park to help get aid flowing and reach people who may be injured or trapped, said Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, spokesman for Indonesia’s Disaster Mitigation Agency.