A local disaster agency official told AFP on Monday ( May 13 ) that the number of people killed by flash floods and cold lava flowing from a volcano in western Indonesia has increased to 41 and 17 more are still missing.
On Saturday night, heavy rain and heavy rain poured huge volcanic rocks down two Sumatra island regions, inundating roads, homes, and mosques.
” Data as of last night, we recorded 37 dying patients… But from this morning it has grown again, the figure reached 41 ( dead )”, Ilham Wahab, West Sumatra disaster mitigation agency official, told AFP.
Firefighters were searching for 17 also missing, three in Agam region and 14 in Tanah Datar, both the worst- hit sections of the storm and household to hundreds of thousands of people, he said.
Because authorities had advised people to “vacate to relatives ‘ locations, which are safer” than camp shelters in heavy rains, Ilham could not confirm how many visitors had evacuated.
” We are focused on second, searching and rescuing the victims, next, protecting the survivors, protecting the susceptible people”, he said.
Streets in the towns were turned into river, with temples and houses damaged.
Vegetables were swept into a local river by heavy rains, while huge rocks and volcanic ash poured down Mount Marapi, causing filthy flood waters into neighborhoods.
Warm volcano, also known as lahar, is geological materials such as dust, sand and pebbles carried down a supervolcano slopes by rain.