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PALU, Indonesia – Brightly colored body bags were placed side by side in a freshly dug joint grave on Monday, while a hard-hit Indonesian town buried its victims of the devastating earthquake and tsunami that killed more than 840 homeless people.
The death toll, mainly in the city of Palu, should continue to increase as the areas isolated by the damage will be reached. The magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Friday at dusk and generated a tsunami that would have reached 6 meters high.
The local army commander, Tiopan Aritonang, said that 545 bodies would be brought to the grave by a single hospital. The trench dug in Palu was 10 meters by 100 meters and could be expanded if necessary, said Willem Rampangilei, head of the Indonesian National Disaster Mitigation Agency.
"It must be done as soon as possible for sanitary and religious reasons," he said. Indonesia is predominantly Muslim and a religious custom requires burials shortly after death, usually in one day.
Local army spokesman Mohammad Thorir said the area adjacent to a public cemetery could hold 1,000 bodies. All victims, from local hospitals, were photographed to help families locate where their loved ones were buried. Video footage showed residents walking from one body bag to the other, opening the tops to check if they could identify the faces.
Around noon, teams of workers, their mouths covered with masks, carried 18 bodies and deposited them in the trench. A backhoe waited to push the ground over the dead. More burials had to follow.
Military and commercial aircraft delivered aid and supplies. But there was a need for heavy equipment to reach possible survivors buried in collapsed buildings, including an eight-story hotel in Palu where voices had been heard in the rubble.
People suffering from a lack of food and supplies were also becoming more desperate. Local television reported that about 3,000 residents had flocked to Palu airport to try and get out of it. Images showed some people screaming in anger because they were not able to board a departing military plane. The airport has taken over only a few commercial flights.
"We have not eaten for three days!" Shouted a woman. "We just want to be safe!"
Indonesian President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo has cleared the acceptance of international aid, said Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, spokesman for the relief agency, adding that the generators, l & # 39; Heavy equipment and tents were among the necessary items. He said that the European Union and 10 countries had offered their assistance, including the United States, Australia and China.
"We will send food today as much as possible with several devices," Widodo told reporters in the capital, Jakarta, adding that fuel supply should also arrive.
Nugroho said the conditions in the Balaroa section of Palu were particularly bad because the earthquake had caused violent uprising and subsidence of the ground, trapping many people under destroyed houses. In Petobo, another area of the city, the vehicle caused liquefaction of loose, wet soil, creating a thick, heavy mud that caused considerable damage.
"In Petobo, it is estimated that there are still hundreds of victims buried in mud material," Nugroho said.
Villagers who found loved ones – alive and dead – over the weekend expressed their frustration that it took rescue teams until Monday to reach Petobo.
Edi Setiawan, 32, said he and the other villagers were able to save five children and four adults, including a pregnant woman. However, his sister and his father were not among them.
"My sister was found kissing her father," he said. "My mother survived after fighting mud and being rescued by villagers.
Another villager, Idrus, 52, who uses a single name, said that "until Saturday, we still saw a lot of people shouting from the rooftops. But we could not do anything to help them. Now, their cries are no longer heard.
According to the National Search and Rescue Agency, the National Search and Rescue Agency, which published photos, reported that survivors were still being pulled from the rubble at various locations, including a 25-year-old woman found alive on Sunday. evening in the ruins of the Roa-Roa hotel. from her lying on a stretcher covered with a blanket.
Novry Wullur, an agent with the Indonesian search and rescue agency, said that 15-year-old Nurul Istiharah had managed to survive the painful experience. She was stuck in her house after her collapse. Her mother and niece had died next to her and the water had left her submerged up to her neck and was threatening to drown herself. Her legs were finally released and she was removed from the rubble alive. She was treated for hypothermia at a local hospital.
The number of deaths confirmed by Nugroho on Monday afternoon was 844, an increase of only 12 days since the day before, with almost all of Palu. The regencies of Donggala, Sigi and Parigi Moutong – with a combined population of 1.2 million – have not yet been fully evaluated. Nearly 50,000 people have been displaced from their homes in Palu alone, Nugroho said.
He said 114 foreigners were in Palu and Donggala during the disaster. All were counted except one Belgian, one South Korean and six French.
This is the latest natural disaster to hit Indonesia, which is frequently hit by earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and tsunamis because of its location on the 'fire belt', an arch of volcanoes and fault lines in the Pacific Basin. In December 2004, a major earthquake of magnitude 9.1 off the island of Sumatra, in western Indonesia, triggered a tsunami that killed 230,000 people in a dozen countries. More recently, a powerful earthquake on the island of Lombok killed 505 people in August.
In Donggala, the site closest to the epicenter of the earthquake, aerial footage broadcast on Metro TV showed the beaches of blond and sweet sand swept away by the sea, as well as some buildings. Some buildings in the city have been badly damaged, with shredded plywood walls and pieces of concrete scattered on the sidewalk. Much of the damage, however, seemed to be limited to the waterfront.
Palu, which has more than 380,000 inhabitants, was strewn with debris from the earthquake and tsunami. A heavily damaged mosque was half submerged and a shopping center was reduced to a crumpled hulk. A large bridge with yellow arches has collapsed.
The city is built around a narrow bay that apparently would have amplified the strength of the tsunami as the waves surged into the narrow cove. Nugroho said the water would have reached 6 meters in some places.
In a devastated area of Palu, residents said dozens of people could still be buried in their homes.
"The soil is high as a spine and suddenly fell. Many people were trapped and buried under collapsed houses. I could not do anything to help, "resident Nur Indah said crying. "In the evening, some of them turned on their cell phones just to give a sign that they were there. But the lights were off later and the next day.
With hundreds injured, the hospitals damaged by the earthquake were submerged.
Indonesia is a vast archipelago of over 17,000 islands home to 260 million people. Roads and infrastructure are poor in many areas, making access difficult under the best conditions.
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Associated Press editors Margie Mason, Todd Pitman, Ali Kotarumalos and Chris Nusatya in Jakarta, Indonesia, contributed to this report.
Copyright 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, disseminated, rewritten or redistributed.
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