Local officials earlier put the death toll at 18, with five missing.
Jakarta:
The death toll from flash floods and landslides on the Indonesian island of Sumatra has risen to 21, with six people still missing, an official said on Sunday.
Heavy rains on Thursday triggered a disaster in West Sumatra’s Paisirnan district, forcing more than 75,000 people to evacuate.
“As of Sunday, 21 people have been found dead and six missing,” Fajar Sukma, an official at the West Sumatra Disaster Mitigation Agency, told AFP by phone on Sunday.
Fajar said a village on a hillside in Sutera subdivision was badly hit, with about 200 families in the area isolated after landslides and flash floods.
Local officials earlier put the death toll at 18, with five missing.
Local search and rescue official Abdul Malik said rescuers were searching for missing people on Sunday, with authorities focusing their operations on three disaster-affected areas.
“Today’s search involved approximately 150 people from the West Sumatra Disaster Relief Organization,” Abdul said in a statement.
Doni Gusrizal, a senior official at the Pesisir Selatan Disaster Mitigation Agency, said the water had begun to recede after the floods, but added that access to landslide-affected areas remained difficult due to the rugged terrain.
In Padang Pariaman regency in West Sumatra, heavy rains earlier this week caused rivers to swell, triggering floods and landslides that killed at least three people, according to a statement from local disaster relief agencies.
Indonesia is prone to landslides during the rainy season, a problem exacerbated by deforestation in some places, with prolonged heavy rains leading to flooding in some parts of the archipelago nation.
In December, landslides and floods near Lake Toba on the island of Sumatra washed away dozens of homes, destroyed a hotel and killed at least two people.
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