The search and rescue (SAR) team looking for seven missing victims, believed swept away by the mud flood in a landslide incident at Sen Fu Oil Palm Estate in Tongod, Kinabatangan, last Saturday, requires heavy machinery to ease the operation at the search location.

Malaysia Civil Defence Force (APM) Sabah director, Col Mulliadi Al-Hamdi said from the observation made by the team, they were in dire need of heavy machinery to lift the timber logs that had been swept away by the mud flood and to remove the collapsed structures of the victim’s (estate worker) house.

He said the SAR team from APM also faced the challenge of rain, although light, and had to walk for a distance of seven kilometres to reach the location, with a number of connecting roads severely damaged.

“Besides heavy machinery, the services of the canine or K-9 unit are also needed as an alternative measure to smoothen the SAR operation. This is for detecting victims stuck or trapped underneath the piles of logs, tree trunks or collapsed structures of the house,” he said in a statement, here, yesterday.

Mulliadi said five members of Keningau APM were involved in the SAR operation to assist the other rescue teams in carrying out the operation which entered the third day yesterday.

In the incident on April 1, the house of an estate worker was swept away by a mud flood in a landslide incident following heavy rain the day before.

Four of the 11 occupants are safe while seven others including three children are still missing and feared trapped underneath piles of logs and debris or swept away by the river nearby. — Bernama

Source:
courtesy of THE BORNEO POST

by BORNEO POST

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