Wayanad landslides: Army recovers 70 bodies, rescues 1,000 people
New Delhi (PTI): Military personnel on Wednesday intensified search and rescue operations in Kerala's Wayanad district, where landslides have claimed more than 100 lives, with the Army saying that it has recovered around 70 bodies so far and rescued nearly 1,000 people.
Extremely heavy rain triggered the landslides in the hilly areas of Wayanad early Tuesday, leaving at least 132 people dead and more than 200 injured.
Four columns from the Defence Security Corps (DSC) Centre, Kannur, and 122 TA Battalion are conducting combined rescue operations along with the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and state rescue teams, a senior Army official said.
Around 70 bodies have been recovered by the Army so far and approximately 1,000 people have been rescued, the official said.
Two Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) columns, including two medical teams, were airlifted from Trivandrum to Kozhikode by AN32 and C-130 aircraft. They arrived at Kozhikode airport late Tuesday night and stayed overnight, the Army said.
Movement of fuel and other administrative stores is planned by road, the officials said.
Brig Arjun Seagan, Commandant of the PARA Regiment Training Centre, arrived with his team late on Tuesday night. They conducted a reconnaissance of a potential bridge site and established a control centre for coordinating the Army's HADR efforts, supported by the commandant of the DSC Centre, they said.
Heavy engineering equipment and rescue dog teams were airlifted and disaster relief teams were dispatched by the Indian Coast Guard (ICG) on Tuesday.
The state government has requested the deployment of a 690-feet Bailey bridge. Currently, up to 330 feet of the bridge is being moved from the Madras Engineer Group Centre, Bengaluru, by road. The remaining parts are being airlifted from Delhi Cantonment, the Army had said late on Tuesday.
The Indian Army is coordinating closely with state authorities to ensure swift and effective relief efforts, officials added.
"Construction of a bridge on the Meepadi-Chooralmala Road will commence, including the induction of certain earthmoving equipment to the other side of the stream utilising air effort," the Army said on Wednesday.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
