Wayanad landslides: Kerala CM’s office says chances of finding more survivors bleak

With rescue operations entering the third day, Kerala Chief Minister’s office says chances of finding more survivors trapped in landslide-levelled Mundakkai, Chooralmala and Attamalai settlements in Vythiri taluk in Wayanad district are dim

With rescue operations entering the third day on August 1, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan’s (CMO) office said the chances of finding more survivors trapped in the landslide-levelled Mundakkai, Chooralmala and Attamalai settlements in Vythiri taluk in Wayanad district were dim.

The CMO put the official death toll at 177. The deceased included 81 men, 70 women and 25 children. The next of kin have identified 98 bodies. However, a Revenue department official said the death toll could rise further.

The government said 29 children were missing. District Educational Officer V.A. Saseendra Vyas stated that most were Mundakkai and Vellarmala government school students. The General Education department was collating the details of the missing students. 

Forensic doctors could not identify the gender of one dead body. They autopsied 225 bodies, many mangled. Rescue workers discovered 92 dismembered bodies.

The government has insisted that forensic experts conduct post-mortem examinations in three minutes per body or body part. Police and forensic teams were also collecting DNA samples of the dead for identification. 

Emergency responders rescued 234 persons from the disaster zone. The landslide decimated an estimated 348 houses. 

The General Officer Commanding (GOC), Kerala-Karnataka sub-area, Major General V.T. Mathew, informed the government that the odds were that no one was left alive in the disaster zone.