Tomorrow, the search for bodies of quake victims in C. Sulawesi has called off

News24xx.com -  The national disaster mitigation agency of Indonesia has called off the search starting on Thursday, October 11 2018  citing concern about the spread of disease.

Until now, the rescue workers in Indonesia stepped up their search on Wednesday, October 10 2018 for victims of a catastrophic earthquake and tsunami, hoping to find as many bodies as they can before the deadline for their work to halt.

The national disaster mitigation agency said the debris will be cleared and areas where bodies lie will eventually be turned into parks, sports venues and memorials.

As infomation, until now, the official says the death toll from the disasters stood at 2,010. Most of the bodies have been found in the seaside city of Palu, on the west coast of Sulawesi island, 1,500km northeast of the capital, Jakarta.

But, perhaps as many as 5,000 victims of the 7.5-magnitude earthquake and tsunami on September 28 have yet to be found, because most of them entombed in flows of mudflows that surged from the ground when the quake agitated the soil into a liquid mire or called as tsunami land.

More than 10,000 rescue workers are scouring expanses of debris, especially in three areas obliterated by soil liquefaction in the south of the small city. And at least nine excavators were working through the rubble of Balaroa, picking their way through smashed buildings and pummeled vehicles. 

"There are so many children still missing, we want to find them quickly," said Amin, who is from Balaroa. "It doesn't matter if it's my family or not, the important thing is that we find as many as we can."

The decision of the national disaster mitigation agency of Indonesia to end the search has angered some relatives of the missing. A taxi driver named Rudy Rahman, 40, said he had to accept it.

"As long as they keep searching, I will be here every day looking for my son," said Rahman, who said he lost three sons in the disaster. 

The bodies of his two children were found, but the youngest is missing.

"This is the only thing I can do, otherwise I would go insane. If they stop what can I do? There are four metres of soil here. I couldn't do it on my own" he said, choking back tears.

While Indonesian workers searched, the disaster agency ordered independent foreign aid workers to leave the earthquake zone.
 

 

 

 

 

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