"Race against time"

2000 buried in landslide in Papua New Guinea

(Bild: AP/Mohamud Omer/International Organization for Migration)

According to local authorities, more than 2000 people were buried in the devastating landslide that occurred on Friday in a remote area of the island state of Papua New Guinea - as reported by krone.at. Hopes of rescuing those still alive are fading.

"The landslide has buried more than 2,000 people alive and caused great destruction," wrote the country's civil protection agency in a letter to the United Nations (UN) on Monday, which was obtained by the AFP news agency.

Search for missing persons is a "race against time"
There is little hope of finding any survivors. "Three days and seven hours have already passed since the disaster," Serhan Aktoprak from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) office in Port Moresby told AFP on Monday. "So we are in a race against time, but to what extent we can bring people to safety is another question."

The rescue workers were working in dangerous conditions.

(Bild: AP/Mohamud Omer/International Organization for Migration)

Hope of finding those still alive is fading
The inaccessibility of the region and the masses of earth that had slipped away meant that the hope of finding any living people quickly faded. The central province of Enga is characterized by tropical forests and a huge mountain range with rugged valleys, some of which are not accessible by road and can only be reached by air.

The rescue teams were working in dangerous conditions. "Rocks continue to fall and move the ground," said Aktoprak. "To make matters worse, groundwater is flowing under the rubble, turning the surface of the ground into a slide." Heavy machinery and excavators were supposed to arrive at the site of the accident on Sunday evening. However, their transportation was delayed by fighting between rival tribes along the only route that was not blocked by the landslide.

Houses buried under meters of rubble
The disaster occurred on Friday in a remote area of the island nation in Oceania. The exact extent of the disaster is not yet entirely clear. On Sunday, the UN reported that around 670 people were feared dead (see video above). "An estimated 150 houses are buried", the organization announced. The houses were buried six to eight meters deep under the rubble.

Papua New Guinea is located north of Australia. Due to its proximity to the equator, the country frequently experiences heavy rainfall. The island nation, which has around ten million inhabitants, is also located on the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire. Earthquakes occur there time and again.