Death toll from Indonesian floods exceeds 900

The death toll from recent floods in Indonesia has exceeded 900, with hundreds still missing.

A rare and powerful cyclone swept through the Strait of Malacca last week, bringing heavy rains and landslides to parts of the Southeast Asian country and destroying more than 100,000 homes.

Efforts are still underway to get help to people in areas still cut off from the outside world, with aid having to be airdropped to some places.

The Indonesian flooding is one of several extreme weather events to hit Asia in recent weeks, with the cumulative death toll in Sri Lanka, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam approaching 2,000.

In Aceh Tamian, one of Indonesia’s worst-hit regions, survivors described villages being completely washed away by fast-moving floods.

A survivor in Lintang Bawah village told BBC Indonesia that people survived by sitting on top of their homes.

“There were also people who lived on the roof with their four-year-old children for three days without food or water,” Fitriana said.

She said about 90 percent of the houses in her village were destroyed, leaving 300 families with nowhere to go.

One man told how he and his family evacuated by boat when floodwaters reached the second floor of his home, but needed to escape again to a nearby village.

He said: “That night, when we were sleeping, the water suddenly soaked the mattresses we were sleeping on (in Gampoeng Dalam village). But we could not go elsewhere because there was no higher ground.

“Luckily, my daughter-in-law’s house has two floors. So we climbed upstairs and we survived.”

The region’s governor said emergency teams were still searching for bodies in “waist-deep” mud, AFP reported.

“Many people need basic necessities. Many areas in Aceh’s remote areas remain unaffected,” he said.

“People don’t die from floods, they die from hunger. That’s just the way it is.”

Indonesian media reported that inmates were being released from a prison as flooding threatened to engulf it, with officials saying there was nowhere else to send them.

As of Sunday, land access to the two regions of West Borga city and central Tapanuri remained cut off, with aid reaching only by air and sea respectively.

Robbery incidents were reported at supermarkets in some areas.