Twelve Killed in Sukabumi Landslide

Jakarta Globe, AFP, Mar 29, 2015

Rescuers carry a dead body after a landslide hit Jemblung village, in Central
Java's Banjarnegara district, on Dec. 13, 2014. (EPA Photo/Gugus Mandiri)

Jakarta. Twelve people were killed and 11 houses buried after a landslide triggered by heavy rain in Indonesia’s main island of Java, an official said on Sunday.

The landslide hit Tegal Panjang village in Sukabumi district in west Java late on Saturday after a particularly heavy downpour, National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said.

“We found all 12 bodies,” he said in an update, revising the earlier death toll of 10 and two missing.

He said heavy rain caused a cliff to collapse and hit the village, burying 11 houses.

Landslides triggered by heavy rains and floods are common in tropical Indonesia during the rainy season.

The BNPB estimates around half the country’s 250 million population lives in areas prone to landslides.

The vast Indonesian archipelago is one of the most natural disaster-prone nations on Earth, and is also frequently hit by earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

Agence France-Presse