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KUALA LUMPUR – The Selangor Fire and Rescue Department has 135 personnel on duty tonight searching for the nine remaining victims of the Batang Kali landslide.
The department’s deputy director Wan Md Razali Wan Ismail said they would be on duty until this morning.
“In terms of the assignment of personnel, we will have a rotation so that the operation is not affected and all personnel who enter the search area are in a state of readiness,” Bernama reported him saying at the search site in Batang Kali late last night.
Hulu Selangor district police chief Suffian Abdullah earlier said the search-and-rescue operation will continue tonight until 4am today.
The operation will resume again at 9am, he added.
“The search-and-rescue operation for nine more landslide victims will continue despite the rainy weather and challenging surroundings,” he said during a press conference at the search site last night.
As of 9pm, nine out of 94 victims involved in the landslide incident were still reported missing, while 24 have been confirmed dead.
The search site at the Father’s Organic Farm campsite also saw rainy weather yesterday evening, according to Bernama.
Another excavator was brought to the site last night, Astro Awani reported, adding to the four already in use. Rescue dogs have also been at work searching for bodies.
The armed forces are also involved in the operation, with a rotation of an officer and 30 personnel from the 25th Battalion of the Royal Malay Regiment (25 RAMD) mobilised every six hours.
On Friday morning before 2.45am, some 450,000 cubic metres of soil slid down from near the top of the Batang Kali-Genting Highlands trunk road onto campers sleeping in tents below. The landslide covers an area of about 1.21ha, with a depth of 8m.
The Fire and Rescue Department has said that the depth of the landslide and the unstable ground soaked with continuous rainfall in recent days have proven to be challenges to the operation.
Today will be the third day of the search.
Of the 24 dead, the bodies of 14 were claimed today by their next of kin and released from the Sungai Buloh Hospital’s forensic department.
Only six of the deceased have been named by the National Disaster Management Agency. – The Vibes, December 18, 2022