Officials: 60 dead in landslides, flash floods in Jakarta region
JAKARTA, Indonesia — Landslides and floods triggered by torrential downpours have left at least 60 people dead in and around Indonesia’s capital, as rescuers struggled to search for people apparently buried under tons of mud, officials said Saturday.
Monsoon rains and rising rivers submerged a dozen districts in the greater Jakarta area and caused landslides that buried at least a dozen people.
National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Agus Wibowo said most of the fatalities included those who had drowned or been electrocuted since rivers broke their banks early Wednesday after extreme torrential rains hit on New Year’s Eve. Three elderly people died of hypothermia.
It’s the worst flooding in the area since 2007, when 80 people were killed over 10 days.
Rescuers recovered more bodies as flash floods and mudslides destroyed several villages in Lebak, a district in neighboring Banten province, Wibowo said. Rescuers were still searching for two villagers reportedly missing in the landslide, he said.
The number of fatalities was expected to increase, with rescuers and villagers also searching for at least three people believed to be buried in another landslide in Cigudeg village in Bogor district, said Ridwan, the village’s secretary, who goes by a single name.
Ridwan said bad weather, blackouts and mudslides were hampering rescue efforts. He said rescuers Saturday managed to reach eight hamlets that had been isolated for days by cut-off roads and mudslides and rescued more than 1,700 villagers in weak condition.
Four days after the region of 30 million people was struck by flash floods, waters have receded in many middle-class districts, but conditions remain grim in narrow riverside alleys where the city’s poor live.
Elevator drownings: Israeli rescue officials said Saturday that two people drowned as heavy rains flooded an elevator in central Tel Aviv.
Israeli rescue crews had to use scuba gear to reach the elevator and pull out the pair, but they died shortly after arriving at a hospital. Emergency agency Magen David Adom identified the dead only as a man and a woman in their 30s.
The downpour caused flooding in areas across the coastal city of Tel Aviv, forcing road closures and stoking fears of additional deaths. Rain and thunderstorms were expected to continue Sunday.
In the Palestinian enclave of Gaza, heavy rains flooded several streets. There were no reports of casualties.