Search for landslide victims halted

Search for landslide victims halted

JAKARTA (JP): Rescue workers and local authorities agreed on
Friday to call off the search for victims of a landslide,
triggered by days of heavy rains, in the Sangihe Talaud regency
of Sangir island in North Sulawesi.

"We decided to stop the search as the number of missing
residents matches the number of fatalities and survivors that
were found this week," chief of the Search and Rescue Agency
(SAR) in Manado Soleman Moerad Kakoe told The Jakarta Post by
phone.

Soleman, who had just arrived from the site of the incident on
Friday, also said the death toll was 32 and not higher as
reported earlier.

"During the search and rescue operation, data got mixed up.
Actually some 20 people who were reported missing were already
included in the list of fatalities," he explained.

Rescue workers managed to recover all but one body which was
pinned under a huge rock, he said.

After failing to extricate the victim, a resident of Ulung
Peliang village in Tamako regency, rescue workers prayed and
decided to let the body rest there.

Soleman said since the villages were located at the foot of a
hill, they were vulnerable to mud flows and landslides.

The landslide follows an earthquake measuring 5.8 on the
Richter scale that hit the regencies of Tamako, Tabukan Utara and
Manganitu in the early hours of Sunday morning, destroying 40
houses and cutting off roads in several places.

Villages ravaged by the earthquake were Karatung II and
Toloarane in Manganitu regency; Belengan and Ulung Peliang in
Tamako regency; and Bangkitang in Tabukan regency. The affected
area is only 15 kilometers from Tahuna port or 209 km from the
port of Manado.(edt)