Neck deep in slush, ravaged Wayanad villages count 246 dead

WAYANAD: On day two of the rescue mission at Mundakkai and Chooralmala, two villages near Meppadi in Wayanad district where more than 246 persons were killed when three devastating landslides within four hours of torrential rain wiped off parts of the villages in the wee hours of Tuesday, the rescue team was forced to wind up the operations early on Wednesday evening due to hostile weather conditions.

While the death toll is mounting with bodies still being recovered from various parts of the region, 240 persons are still missing as per the district administration. It seems to be a long wait for the family groups staying on the hospital premises at Meppadi for the last two days to identify if any of their lost loved ones are among the dead and to bid a final farewell.

Meanwhile, the rescue team had a narrow escape on Wednesday evening when the walking bridge they constructed submerged in the water gushing from the hills. Going by official data, the real magnitude of the calamity is yet to be assessed as hundreds are still missing and countless houses buried deep in the soil are inaccessible to the volunteers.

With a bridge across the river between Chooralmala and Mundakkai washed off, the rescue operations are facing stiff hurdles to source food, water, rescue tools and earthmovers to the upper terrains of Mundakkai village which was almost wiped out.

Bailey bridge components from Chennai reaches Kannur airport

The construction of a temporary Bailey bridge by the Army is still incomplete as its components are yet to arrive. The district administration claims that it will be ready by Thursday evening since all components for the construction, despatched by the Madras Engineering Group (MEG) of the Army on a special Air Force flight from Chennai, have already reached Kannur airport. The components would now travel to Wayanad by road on 15 trucks.

As per the data of the Meppadi panchayat administration, among the 504 buildings in the village, 375 are houses of which 150 are buried in mud and slush. “The number of missing persons is so high that we are afraid to reveal it hoping that many of them would have escaped before the catastrophe struck," said Nousahd Ali, secretary of Meppadi panchayat.

While the rescue team recovered 92 dead bodies trapped in debris on Wednesday, more than 1,500 persons were rescued from the debris of houses in Mundakkai village.

A mammoth crowd could be seen waiting in a makeshift pandal on Meppadi panchayat office premises on Wednesday evening to receive the mortal remains of 57 victims, recovered from the River Chaliyar at Pothukallu and neighbouring villages near Nilambur in Malappuram district. The avalanche from the hills was so strong that the human bodies were pushed down for more than six kilometres downstream, passing the steep valleys and three waterfalls.

Teachers identifying bodies of school students at Meppadi

At the Community Health Centre, Meppadi a group of teachers from Government Primary School, Mundakkai and Government VHSS, Vellarimala are involved in an excruciating mission of identifying the recovered bodies of their wards as all the kith and kin were missing.

So far 14 students of the two schools were confirmed dead whereas more than 34 students are still missing. The primary school has more than 50 students and the VHSS has 702 students. Unnikrishnan, the headmaster in charge of the high school, who played a lead role in the progress of the institution, was all tears as he narrated the plight of his wards and parents. "We have identified many of our wards among the dead while many are still missing," he said.

(By special arrangement)