Little progress is being made in recovering bodies from a huge landslide that has engulfed villages in the remote Enga province of Papua New Guinea.
Efforts to recover bodies are being hampered by smaller landslides that continue to occur.
The disaster happened about 600 kilometres (372 miles) northwest of the capital, Port Moresby, at approximately 3 a.m. local time on May 24, leaving debris that humanitarian workers say cover an area the size of four football fields.
More than 150 houses were buried, and the country’s National Disaster Center said almost 2,000 were feared dead.
International and PNG government rescue efforts have struggled to reach such a remote part of the country, leaving villagers with no option but to dig through the collapsed mountainside with whatever tools they had.
They managed to recover six people alive. Five bodies have also been recovered, along with a limb from a sixth person.
Local community leader Miok Michael told CNN that it was unlikely they would find any more survivors.
“People are gathering and mourning,” he said. “People have been digging since day one but can’t locate bodies as they are covered by huge rocks. Only machines will do.”
The ongoing slips are affecting land beyond the original rockfall, and the government has ordered 7,000 people to leave amid concerns of the outbreak of disease.
Some people in the most high-risk areas were already being evacuated, and recovery efforts had been paused while this occurred.
A long-running tribal conflict has complicated matters, making it harder for aid workers to access the site. Eight people were killed and 30 houses set alight in fighting on May 25.
Meanwhile, a state of emergency has been declared, and the military has taken control, providing security. The engineering battalion is also leading the emergency work, assisted by the fire service, police, and an emergency medical team.
Breaking Rocks Sounding Like ‘Bombs’
Enga provincial disaster committee chair and provincial administrator, Sandis Tsaka, told RNZ Pacific that the sound of rocks breaking when they fell were reminiscent of bombs or gunshots.“It’s terrible, it’s scary,” he said.
“What used to be a densely populated community area with an abundance of life with schools and kids is now looking like the surface of the moon, a pile of rocks. It’s sad, it’s a level of devastation that we’ve never seen in this part of the world.”
“This year, we had extraordinary rainfall that has caused flooding in river areas, sea level rise in coastal areas and landslips in a few areas,” he told Parliament. “We have faced extraordinary weather patterns and changes from dryness to wetness.”
Deputy Prime Minister John Rosso added, “The climate change effects that are here now is not just in Enga, for the last two months we have seen unprecedented disasters throughout the country.”
Meanwhile, New Zealand Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Judith Collins said their government would provide NZ$1.5 million of support, deploy a New Zealand Defence Force C-130 aircraft with relief supplies and technical expertise, as well as direct financial assistance.
