Pupils start to return to school in ruined city

CHILDREN in the Indonesian city of Palu began returning to school yesterday to tidy up classrooms and hopefully see their friends 10 days after a major earthquake and tsunami struck.

The 7.5-magnitude quake on September 28 brought down many buildings in the small city on Sulawesi island, 1 500km north-east of Jakarta.

But the biggest killer was probably soil liquefaction, which happens when a powerful quake turns the ground into a liquid mire and which obliterated several Palu neighbourhoods.

The death toll rose to 1948 and bodies are still being recovered. No one knows how many people are missing, especially in the areas hit by liquefaction, but it could be as many as 5000, the national disaster agency said.

At one high school, teenagers dressed in grey-and-white uniforms swept up broken glass in the classrooms. Trophies had fallen from a broken showcase and the basketball court was cracked.

“It’s sad to see our school like this,” said Dewi Rahmawati, 17, who expects to graduate next year and wants to study economics at university. The pupils found out that they had to turn up for school through messages on Facebook and WhatsApp.

School principal Kasiludin said authorities told all teachers to show up for work from Monday to collect information on pupil numbers.

“We won’t force the students to come back because many are traumatised. But we must start again soon, to keep their spirits up and so they don’t fall behind,” he said.

The school had lost at least seven pupils and one teacher, he said.

Across the city, nine schools were destroyed, 22 teachers were killed and 14 were missing, the disaster agency said, adding that 140 tents had been