RAIN WRATH: Kerala woke up to face one of its worst natural calamities after the 2018 floods on Tuesday.

Multiple rain-triggered landslides that hit Mundakkai in the picturesque Wayanad district and their impact in Chooralmala village downhill left at least 123 dead and many missing on Tuesday.

The landslides that struck when the residents were fast asleep left a trail of death and destruction with Mundakkai and Chooralmala villages almost completely wiped out. The villages had received very heavy rain — 300mm — in the last 24 hours.

Mundakkai was cut off with the only bridge connecting it to Chooralmala washed away by gushing waters and tumbling boulders and uprooted trees. The landslides swept away even sturdy buildings, including a school, a number of houses and living quarters of plantation workers, roads and the electricity infrastructure.

The first landslide that occurred around 2am swept away Mundakkai village, about 25km up the hills from Kalpetta, the district headquarters. That was followed by a second landslide around 4am and another one at 6am. The landslides that gathered momentum then wrecked havoc in Chooralmala village, about 3km downhill.

In one of the many gut-wrenching sights emerging from the affected zone, a man neck-deep in mud was seen crying out for help. He was rescued after about five hours by state fire services personnel who used a temporary ropeway to literally pluck him out to safety. But not many were as lucky.

Chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan had told a news conference on Tuesday evening that 93 bodies had been recovered and 34 of them had been identified, while 128 injured people were being provided medical care at various hospitals in Wayanad.

A rescue worker crosses a swollen stream. PTI picture

He said 18 of the identified bodies had been handed over to the next of kin. As on Tuesday, 3,069 people had been moved to 45 relief camps in Wayanad.

The power of the gushing waters that washed away everything in their way was such that at least 26 of the dead were found on the banks of the Chaliyar river in Pothukal
in neighbouring Malappuram district, two hours downstream. Many of them were just body parts that would require DNA testing for identification.

An yet-to-be ascertained number of livestock and pet animals also perished in the nature’s fury with carcasses found strewn all along the disaster zone.

Residents along the Chaliyar first noticed larger than usual quantities of drift wood, and even LPG cylinders, being carried by the waters that began to breach the banks. It was then they noticed bodies of men, women and children.

Personnel from the local fire and emergency services and the State Disaster Relief Force were rushed to Chooralmala where hundreds of civilians were already engaged in relief and rescue operations.

About 200 armymen drawn from bases in neighbouring Kannur and Kozhikode and a medical team from the Indian Naval Academy in Kannur joined them in the afternoon.

One of the biggest tourist hubs of Kerala, many holiday resorts in Wayanad had evacuated guests and employees on Monday itself following an alert by thedistrict authorities.

The owner of a holiday resort in Meppadi, about 15km downhill of Mundakkai, told The Telegraph that he had ensured every single person was evacuated. He said he had no idea if the landslides had affected the resort.

“We had evacuated everyone yesterday itself soon after we got an alert from the district authorities. But I have no idea if the landslide has damaged our property,” said the proprietor, who declined to be named.

Plantation workers were among the dead or missingin Mundakkai.

Binil John, who works for the Harrisons Malayalam tea plantation, told a TV channel that 35, including workers and their family members, are yet to be accounted for.

“Our workers and their family members totalling 65 — all of them locals — were living in nine line houses (near the plantation). In two of the four staff quarters nearby (two others are vacant), there was a family in one and four migrant workers in the other. The bodies of two migrant workers have been recovered,” said John.

He said state emergency services and the NDRF used ropes to reach Mundakkai where a large number of local people are missing.

The majority of the injured in Chooralmala were shifted to the Wayanad Institute of Medical Sciences and nearby government hospitals. Health minister Veena George said temporary emergency medical care facilities had been set up at a local mosque and madrasa in Chooralmala.

The state government rushed five ministers to oversee rescue and relief operations and appointed a senior civil servant to coordinate the operations. The government declared two days of mourning when the national flag will fly at half mast.

It also cancelled all government events scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday to focus on the rescue and relief mission.

The leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, and his sister Priyanka Gandhi had planned to visit the affected areas on Wednesday, but have been dissuaded by the authorities. Rahul, who retained Wayanad and won Rae Bareli in the Lok Sabha elections, has given up the Kerala constituency. Priyanka is to contest from Wayanad inthe bypoll.

Rahul had earlier spoken to chief minister Vijayan and taken up the matter in the Lok Sabha, seeking maximum central assistance in relief efforts.

Survivors who lived to tell their tales recalled the horror of waking up to the thundering rumble and gushing flood waters that decimated their homes and swept away their dear ones.

“Before I realised what was happening, I heard loud thuds of water and rocks banging on my house. I couldn’t spot my wife for a while, but managed to get hold of her and escape the fury of the landslide,” a septuagenarian told reporters from his hospital bed.

His son and family who lived in a nearby house too escaped to safety.

But another aged man who wept continuously wasn’t that lucky. “I lost everyone. I couldn’t rescue my wife who got stuck in the slush. I don’t know what really happened and how I escaped. Now I don’t even have documents to prove my identity,” he said.

Typical of Malayalis when faced with disasters, blood banks in Wayanad witnessed long queues with many more potential donors coming forward to do their bit.

In its worst ever natural calamity in about a hundred years, Kerala had endured extensive floods in 2018 when more than 480 lives were lost.