200 Families Missing As Sri Lankan Landslides Bury Three villages

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Thursday, May 19th, 2016

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Torrential rains and flooding across country force more than 137,000 people from their homes, with 36 confirmed dead.

Rescuers are looking for more than 200 families who are missing following massive landslides in a remote area on the slopes of Sri Lanka’s Central Hills.

The Sri Lankan Red Cross said the landslides, which struck on Tuesday after three days of heavy rain, buried three villages – Siripura, Pallebage and Elagipitya – in Kegalle district.

“Rescuers would have to get there by foot and start digging with their hands before we can get any heavy equipment in to the site,” Mahieash Johnney, senior manager of communications at the Red Cross, said.

The area had received over 100mm of rain between 15 and 16 May and at least two nearby villages had been evacuated due to fears of a fresh landslide, Red Cross officials said.

Torrential rains across Sri Lanka have forced more than 137,000 people from their homes.

Rohan Dias, a deputy police inspector, said it was not known how many people had survived the landslides.

“There are about 800 people gathered in the nearby temples including the people from the neighbouring villages fearing their villages could also be affected. There are another 400 people in the roads who have come to see their relatives,” Dias said.

WM Abeywickrema, Kegalle district secretary, told a local private TV channel that around 400 people had been rescued so far.

AG Kamala, 52, who had just returned to her house in Siripura village when the landslides hit, told Associated Press: “I heard a huge sound like a plane crashing into the earth. I opened my door. I could not believe my eyes, as I saw something like a huge fireball rolling down the mountain and again a huge sound.”

The Disaster Management Centre (DMC) said dozens of houses were destroyed when mountain slopes collapsed, forcing hundreds of villagers to evacuate. The military said dozens of service personnel and eight army officers had been deployed to the rescue area near the town of Aranayaka.

Troops also launched rescue operations in inundated areas of the Indian Ocean island, with boats and helicopters pulling more than 200 people trapped in the north-western coastal district of Puttalam to safety, officials said.

“This is the worst torrential rain we have seen since 2010,” said Pradeep Kodippili, a DMC spokesman. Nineteen of Sri Lanka’s 25 districts have been hit.

Heavy rains also struck the neighbouring Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala. More than 100 houses were damaged in coastal Kerala and about 50 families had been shifted to a relief camp in the state capital, Thiruvananthapuram, a state official said.

The forecast was for heavy rains across Tamil Nadu over the next two days and fishermen were warned not to go out to sea.

Flooded roads and fallen trees led to traffic jams in Colombo. Trains were halted as water submerged railway tracks, officials said.

Flooding and drought are cyclical in Sri Lanka, which is battered by a southern monsoon between May and September, while a north-eastern monsoon runs from December to February.

More than 300,000 people were forced out of their homes due to heavy rains and flooding in December 2010 and January 2011. In October 2014 dozens of tea plantation workers were killed when landslides buried their hillside homes.

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