Indonesian rescuers on Tuesday continued sifting through tonnes of garbage and debris but hopes were faint of finding anyone alive after a devastating landslide that left 150 people feared dead.
At first light, a small group of relatives and residents began picking through the rubble, despite officials warning there was very little chance any of the 110 still listed as missing would be pulled out alive.
Just more than an hour into the search, the body of a 12-year-old boy was pulled from the wreckage, rescuers said. As rain started to fall again later on Tuesday, rescuers warned they may have to suspend the search.
“We’re afraid there could be further landslides,” local military official Duchari said.
Forty people were confirmed dead and a further 110 residents were listed as missing, according to a crisis coordination team set up at the scene. It said an unknown number of scavengers was probably also missing.
Reaching an accurate toll of the dead and missing was difficult because the landslide had affected two administrative districts, leaving local officials and police giving sometimes incomplete and contradictory figures.
Crowds watched as police and army teams picked though piles of brick and rubble, while a mechanical digger cleared away tonnes of dirt.
Distraught relatives looked on helplessly, some clinging to the faint hope that anyone would be pulled out alive.
Jeje (32), a farmer, said his father, mother and younger brothers are among the missing.
“I can’t think clearly any more. I just hope that their bodies are found,” he said.
Another, Ayip (23), said he had been staying at a friend’s house when the disaster struck.
“I realised something was wrong when I called home and there was no answer. My brother’s cellphone did not answer. There were six people at home. None of them has been found,” he said.
A local Red Cross official, Nanang Triatna (27), said the hopelessness of the search is taking its toll on the rescuers.
“Sometimes I feel like giving up because we have only our hands and we can only do so much,” he said.
About 20 soldiers and a similar number of volunteers were working on the remains of one house, trying to extricate the corpse of a man in his forties. His torso was uncovered on Monday but his legs remained trapped in the debris.
The body of one woman was pulled out of the twisted wreckage of a home still clutching the lifeless body of a child in her arms, the state Antara news agency reported.
The stench of waste and decay hung heavy in the air.
The landslide struck in the early hours of Monday when people were asleep and flattened up to 70 homes built in the shadow of a dumpsite at Cimahi, near Bandung, about 200km south-east of Jakarta.
One survivor, 22-year-old Neneng, lost six relatives in the landslide. She and her husband were woken by a deep rumbling sound.
“It sounded like the noise of a creaking old bed,” she said.
Whole houses and trees lay buried under tonnes of earth and rubbish, with splintered rafters poking through the mass of earth and smashed roof tiles and wooden beams littering the area.
Police Commissioner Susiyanti said on Monday there was little chance any of those trapped under the mountain of garbage and earth would be rescued alive.
“It appears that all of them are buried and it is very likely that they are all dead.”
“The situation is still grave but we will continue rescue efforts while the weather still allows us to do so,” she added.
The dumpsite was located on top of a hill above the homes and heavy rain had saturated the mountains of trash, causing the disaster, she explained.
Local official Ahmad Rukhiyat blamed the tragedy on “unregulated waste disposal over the course of 15 years”.
Landslides are common in Indonesia during the rainy season, especially on the most populated and mountainous island of Java.
Last year, at least 42 people were killed in West Sumatra when a landslide buried a bus under tonnes of soil, trees and bushes. — AFP