Sudanese villagers dig with hands to reach landslide victims, group says

Villagers in a remote area of Sudan’s western Darfur region are trying to reach buried victims by hand after a devastating landslide on Sunday, aid group Save the Children says.

“People are excavating by hand to rescue the bodies of their relatives since there are no tools or machinery”, Francesco Lanino, the group’s deputy Sudan director for programmes and operations, said.

It is unclear how many people died. Figures range from as high as 1,000 from an armed group in charge of the area, to a figure from the national health ministry that says only two bodies have been recovered.

Save the Children said at least 373 bodies had been recovered, according to the head of the Civil Authority.

Mr Lanino said “1,000 lives may have been lost, including an estimated 200 children.”

Save the Children staff described scenes of “destruction and devastation” after the landslide caused by heavy rainfall. Mr Lanino said teams on location believe the landslide to be “one of the most tragic and large-scale disasters in the region’s history”.

He added that in the impacted Tarseen area, which is made up of five villages, there is only one known survivor in the worst-hit village.

Independently verifying the impact of the landslide has been difficult due to the remoteness of the area.

However, through analysis of satellite imagery, BBC Verify was able to identify nine buildings and structures that were washed away in the disaster.

It took Save the Children aid workers more than six hours to cross nearly 14 miles (22km) of rocky, muddy terrain from their office to the impacted area.

Aid workers had travelled on donkey to reach the Tarseen area in order to deliver the first batch of humanitarian supplies to survivors.

The ongoing civil war in Sudan has also made rescue efforts more challenging, another aid group World Vision stated.

Separately from the landslide, Sudan is currently facing a humanitarian crisis due to fighting between the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) group and the army.

Estimates for the death toll from the civil war vary significantly, but a US official last year estimated up to 150,000 people had been killed since hostilities began in 2023.

Twelve million people have fled their homes.