MAWLAMYINE: Thedeath toll from a landslide triggered by monsoon rains in eastern Myanmar roseto at least 34, an official said yesterday, as emergency workers continued adesperate search through thick mud for scores more feared missing. A huge browngash on the hillside marked where the deluge of mud flooded onto Ye Pyar Konevillage in Mon state on Friday, wiping out 16 homes.
Search and rescueteams worked through the night with excavators and their bare hands trying tofind survivors and recover bodies from the deep sludge, continuing throughyesterday. "We found 34 dead, and the search for dead bodies is stillongoing," local administrator Myo Min Tun told AFP. So far, 47 people havebeen injured while officials believe that more than 80 people could still bemissing. Myanmar is battered annually by a monsoon season which strikescountries across Southeast Asia, leaving tens of thousands displaced fromflooded homes and setting off deadly landslides.
Aerial picturesof Ye Pyar Kone village showed shattered remnants of rooftops and other debrisfrom the houses strewn next to trucks knocked over by the force of theonslaught. Its hillside temple was left inundated, leaving the pagoda's goldenspire peeking out from beneath the mud. Htay Htay Win, 32 said that two of herdaughters and five other relatives had still not been found. She only survivedbecause she had left her home minutes earlier to look at the flooding nearby."I heard a huge noise and turned round to see my home being hit by themud," she said, crying.
Mud and water
Rescue workersyesterday continued to carry out excavated bodies wrapped in plastic to waitingambulances, wading through pools of water and ankle-deep sludge. Cryingrelatives of the missing watched on helpless under a steady torrent of rain, asnearby floodwaters edged closer to the village.
Tin Htay, whoescaped with his family from their home, described his efforts to rescue otherstrapped by the mud. "I dragged a woman and two children from a car but Icould not reach two other people, so I had to leave them," the 30-year-oldsaid. Emergency crews had to unblock the main highway from Yangon toMawlamyine, buried under six feet of sludge. Torrential downpours have burstriverbanks across the country while coastal communities have been warned ofhigher tides.
In the town ofShwegyin in eastern Bago region, residents waded out through waist-deep watersor waited to be rescued by boat after the Sittaung river burst its banks,swallowing entire homes. Around 89,000 people have been displaced by floods inrecent weeks, although many have since been able to return home, according tothe UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Vietnam has alsoexperienced heavy flooding this week with at least eight people killed in thecountry's central highlands and rescuers using a zipline to carry dozens ofothers to safety.- AFP