Landslide burying of a buried person in Lae, Papua-New Guinea, according to local official Billy Joseph
Traumatized villagers are divided over whether heavy machinery should be allowed to dig up and potentially further damage the bodies of their buried relatives, officials said.
Earth-moving equipment used by Papua New Guinea’s military was being transported to the disaster scene 400 kilometers (250 miles) from the east coast city of Lae.
A photo of him giving a check for half a million kina for emergency supplies to a local official was posted by the office.
Billy Joseph flew in an Australian military helicopter from the capital of Port Moresby to the northwest, 600 kilometers away, to gain a firsthand perspective of what is needed.
An excavator was given to the village by a local builder on Sunday, to help them dig with shovels and farm tools to find bodies. Working around the still-shifting debris is treacherous.
The situation remains unstable because of the shifting ground, which is posing ongoing danger to both the rescue teams and survivors, according to the United Nations.
The landslide buried a 200-meter (650-foot) stretch of the province’s main highway. Officials said Tuesday that the highway had been closed from Yampani to Wabag through Lae.
The earthquake of Yambali in Papua New Guinea, the source of the last of the world’s largest natural disasters, warned the international organization for migration
The scale of the disaster can be difficult to understand because of challenges on the ground, including a lack of telecommunications and tribal warfare, which means international relief workers and aid convoys need military protection.
The office of Papua New Guinea Prime Minister James Marape did not respond Monday to a request for an explanation of what the government estimate of 2,000 was based on.
The government official in charge of disaster response has formally asked for assistance from the international community, as they believe more than 2,000 people were buried alive.
Estimations by the villagers and officials at the prefecture resulted in the death toll of 670. The previous estimate had been 60 homes.
Estimates of casualties have ranged wildly since the disaster, with few knowing how many people were affected.
The international organization for migration, which is working closely with the government and taking a leading role in the international response, has not changed its estimated death toll of 670 released on Sunday.
“We are not able to dispute what the government suggests but we are not able to comment on it,” said Serhan Aktoprak, the chief of the U.N. migrant agency’s mission in Papua New Guinea.
An official with the UN said Tuesday that there is a risk of a second disaster at the scene of the first one due to water streams and bodies trapped beneath tons of debris.
A mass of boulders, earth and splintered trees devastated Yambali in the South Pacific nation’s remote highlands when a limestone mountainside sheared away Friday. Serhan Aktoprak, the chief of theInternational Organization for Migration’s mission in New Britain, said the blanket of debris has become more unstable because of the recent rain and streams trapped between the ground and rubble.
This is a big concern. The movement of the land, the debris, is causing a serious risk, and overall the total number of people that may be affected might be 6,000 or more,” he said. Some villagers have buried their source of clean drinking water while others lost their vegetable gardens.
“If this debris mass is not stopped, it can move so fast that it can wipe out other communities and villages further down the mountain,” Aktoprak said.
There are serious health risks with corpses decaying and water flowing, Aktoprak said.
Papua New Guinea’s landslip mapping mission: a proposal to the United Nations and the Australian government in papua new Guinea
The Papua New Guinea government on Sunday officially asked the United Nations for additional help and to coordinate contributions from individual nations.
A team from the Australian government was supposed to arrive Tuesday in the country that is Australia’s nearest neighbor. The site will be mapped with the help of a seismology team and drones.
Murray Watt, Australia’s minister for emergency management, said that their role would be to help with the survey of the landslip, and to look for bodies.
Australia’s minister for the Pacific, Pat Conroy, said the government would also provide long-term logistical support for clearing debris, recovering bodies and supporting displaced people. The government announced an initial aid package of 2.5 million Australian dollars ($1.7 million).
The situation was complicated because of the destruction of parts of the road but they have some confidence that they can take in heavy equipment today.