The International Organization for Migration on Sunday increased its estimate of the death toll from a massive landslide in Papua New Guinea to more than 670.
Serhan Aktoprak, the chief of the U.N. migration agency’s mission in the South Pacific island nation, said the revised death toll was based on calculations by Yambali village and Enga provincial officials that more than 150 homes had been buried by Friday’s landslide. The previous estimate had been 60 homes.
“They are estimating that more than 670 people (are) under the soil at the moment,” Aktoprak told The Associated Press.
Local officials had initially put the death toll on Friday at 100 or more. Only five bodies and a leg of a sixth victim had been recovered by Sunday.
Emergency responders in Papua New Guinea were moving survivors to safer ground on Sunday as tons of unstable earth and tribal warfare, which is rife in the country’s Highlands, threatened the rescue effort.
The South Pacific island’s government meanwhile is considering whether it needs to officially request more international support.
Crews have given up hope of finding survivors under earth and rubble 6 to 8 meters (20 to 26 feet) deep, Aktoprak said.
“People are coming to terms with this so there is a serious level of grieving and mourning,” he said.
Government authorities were establishing evacuation centers on safer ground on either side of the massive swath of debris that covers an area the size of three to four football fields and has cut the main highway through the province.
“Working across the debris is very dangerous and the land is still sliding,” Aktoprak said.
Beside the blocked highway, convoys that have transported food, water and other essential supplies since Saturday to the devastated village 60 kilometers (35 miles) from the provincial capital, Wabag, have faced risks related to tribal fighting in Tambitanis village, about halfway along the route. Papua New Guinea soldiers were providing security for the convoys.
Peoplesmind
