Sentani, Indonesia: A baby trapped under rubble after flash flooding destroyed his home in Indonesia has been reunited with his father after the disaster killed the rest of their family, officials said on Monday, as the death toll hit 79.
The five-month old was plucked on Sunday from debris inside a house where his mother and siblings were found dead in the hard-hit town of Sentani. The tot has since been returned to his surviving father.
“We took the baby to the hospital and had him treated,” Papua military spokesman Muhammad Aidi said.
“He was in stable condition and has been released. The father was distressed but happy to be reunited with his baby.”
The news came as Indonesia’s disaster agency raised the official death toll from 58 on Sunday, with more than three dozen people still missing.
Indonesia’s military took up the grim task of putting the corpses of mud-caked victims into body bags, after flash floods and landslides ripped through the area. Scores have been injured in the disaster, triggered by torrential rain on Saturday.
“The death toll could still go up,” said national disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho.
Rescuers battled mud, rocks and fallen trees in the hunt for survivors, as medical personnel treated the wounded in makeshift tents.
“People need food, blankets, clean clothes and clean water,” Nugroho said.
In Doyo, one of the most affected areas, a housing complex was littered with huge rocks believed to have rolled down from a nearby mountain, while sediment and waste were piled up on the pavement. — AFP
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