Emergency convoy delivers provisions to survivors of devastating landslide in Papua New Guinea
MELBOURNE, Australia (SCN) — Survivors searched through tons of earth and rubble by hand looking for missing relatives while a first emergency convoy delivered food, water and other provisions Saturday at the site of a landslide that devastated a remote village in the mountains of Papua New Guinea and was feared to have buried scores of people, officials said.
An assessment team reported “suggestions” that 100 people were dead and 60 houses buried by the mountainside that collapsed in Enga province a few hours before dawn Friday, said Serhan Aktoprak, the chief of the International Organization for Migration’s mission in the South Pacific island nation.
Confirming a firm number of those who have died will be difficult “given it is considered culturally taboo to ask survivors of the status of their relatives,” Aktoprak said.
Only three bodies had been recovered by early Saturday from the vast swath of earth, boulders and splintered trees that struck part of Yambali, a village of nearly 4,000 people that is 600 kilometers (370 miles) northwest of the capital, Port Moresby.
Medical treatment was provided to seven people, including a child, said Aktoprak, who is based in Port Moresby. He had no information about the extent of their injuries.
It is feared that the number of casualties and wounded will increase dramatically,” he said.
A spokesperson for Papua New Guinea Prime Minister James Marape said Saturday he would release information about the scale of the destruction and loss of life when it becomes available.
Philip Mene, an IOM program associate, said survivors “are removing the rubble by hand” as they try to find their relatives.
“It is noticeable that relatives are coming to terms that the people below the debris are all but lost,” he said Saturday.
“Most likely hope recovering any survivors is slowly diminishing.”
All food gardens that sustain the village’s subsistence farming population were destroyed and the three streams that provide drinking water were buried by the landslide.
A convoy left the provincial capital of Wabag on Saturday morning carrying food, water and other essentials to the devastated village 60 kilometers (35 miles) away.
The relief effort was delayed by the landslide closing the province’s main highway, which serves the Porgera Gold Mine and the neighboring town of Porgera.
Further convoys are planned for Sunday, including the arrival of heavy earth-moving machinery to help clear the 6 to 8 meters (20 to 26 feet) of debris, earth and rocks which has fallen from the Mungalo mountain that sits above Yambali.