Weeks of heavy downpours caused a mudslide that killed at least 16 people and left 70 others missing at a railroad construction site in northeast India, officials said Friday, as rescuers resumed clearing operations.
More than 200 disaster response workers and police are using earth-clearing equipment like bulldozers to rescue those buried under the debris in Noney, a town near Imphal, the capital of Manipur state. But the terrain is making it difficult to move heavy equipment, said H. Guite, district magistrate, adding that he has asked for reinforcements.
Intermittent rain continues in the region.
Sixteen bodies have been recovered so far after a hillock caved in and buried the railroad project area, Guite told The Associated Press (AP).
Seven of the confirmed dead were members of the Territorial Army, state chief minister N. Biren Singh said. He said five Indian Railway officials were among those feared missing.
A railway project is being constructed in the area, where there is a rebel insurgency, and army personnel was providing security for railway officials overseeing the project. The state's decades-old insurgency seeks a separate homeland for ethnic and tribal groups.
Continuous rainfall over the past three weeks has wreaked havoc across India's northeast, which has eight states and 45 million people, and in neighboring Bangladesh.
An estimated total of about 200 people have been killed in heavy downpours and mudslides in states including Assam, Manipur, Tripura and Sikkim, while 42 people have died in Bangladesh since May 17. Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced.
Scientists say climate change is a factor behind the erratic, early rains that triggered unprecedented floods. Monsoon rains in South Asia typically begin in June, but torrential rain lashed northeastern India and Bangladesh as early as March this year.
With rising global temperatures due to climate change, experts say the monsoon season is becoming more variable, meaning that much of the rain that would typically fall throughout the season arrives in a shorter period.