People who were stranded at Attamala after the landslide being evacuated through a temporary bridge on July 31, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Thulasi Kakkat
A team of geologists who surveyed the landslide-hit zone in Wayanad on Thursday (August 15, 2024) said a heavy rainfall-induced “damming effect” in a densely forested and uninhabited uphill region had caused the massive earthfall that wiped out three villages at Vythiri taluk in the Wayanad district of Kerala early on July 30.
Geologist John Mathai, who heads the team of experts from the National Centre for Earth Science Studies (NCESC) investigating the landslide, told reporters at ground zero in Wayanad that the group’s finding was merely a “preliminary inference”.
More detailed studies were underway, including soil testing and gauging seismic stability.
Mr. Mathai said 570 mm of rainfall caused the forested hillock to get waterlogged. The saturated soil flowed downwards, forming a temporary “dam” at Seethammakundu.
The rain further boosted the scale of sodden topsoil discharge from uphill, straining the naturally formed dam and imperilling the slope’s stability.
Mr. Mathai said that in the early hours of July 30, the debris outflow stretched the naturally formed barrage to breaking point. It soon collapsed under the momentum of the unabating inflow of soggy mud and debris, including uprooted trees, triggering the hillock slippage that decimated the villages an estimated 6.5 km downhill from the landslide’s provenance.
Mr. Mathai said Puncharimattom, the origin of the landslide, was no longer habitable. However, a large swathe of land at Chooralmala could be reclaimed for the construction of houses. He said the NCESC team would soon submit its final report to the Kerala government.
Search continues
Meanwhile, the harrowing search for bodies of the landslide victims continued downstream Chaliyar river in Nilambur taluk in the neighbouring Malappuram district.
Speaking to reporters in Wayanad, Revenue Minister K. Rajan said 118 persons remained missing. Search teams were scouring the mud and debris the cascading landslide had deposited in the upstream Iruvanipuzha river and downstream Chaliyar for bodies. Central and State government forces were conducting the massive search operation, guided by handlers of cadaver-detecting trained sniffer dogs and local scouts and divers.
Mr. Rajan said the search operations since the landslide yielded 212 body parts, about 173 from either bank of the Chaliyar river in Nilambur. Search teams scouring the river’s banks found 80 bodies out of the total 231 recovered so far.
He said the government had divided the locality into five sectors so that search teams could cover as much ground as possible. The Minister also warned volunteers against undertaking search missions alone. He said mobile phone reception was patchy or non-existent in the forested regions abutting the disaster zone. “Volunteers could easily get lost or trapped.
The district administration might not know about their absence till it is too late”, Mr. Rajan said. He also warned that the rains were set to intensify over Kerala in the coming days and cautioned people against taking unnecessary risks.
