Yunus Ullo and Desi Ullo, two landslide victims in Minyambouw District, Arfak Mountains Regency, West Papua Province, were successfully found by a joint team from the Indonesian Disaster Evacuation Agency, Army and Police after digging with heavy excavator equipment, Monday (27/5/2024). Yunus and Desi are a family that was buried by a landslide on Sunday (26/5/2024) afternoon. Both of them were the last victims with a total of 4 victims who died and one victim survived. The other two deceased victims, namely Etta Dowansiba and Mika Dowansiba, were children, while Jemson Dowansiba was found safe.

Head of the Manokwari Disaster Evacuation Agency, Suyatna, said that all the victims had been found. “Two separate victims were only found today,” said Suyatna via WhatsApp short message. The Head of the Disaster Evacuation Agency said that after the landslide incident, his party sent 12 teams from the Disaster Evacuation Agency to the location from the first day.

Chairman of the West Papua Province Parliament, Orgenes Wonggor, said that the landslide occurred in his village, Mbenti, Minyambouw District. “Yes, that’s my village, yesterday there was a landslide,” said Orgenes Wonggor in Manokwari. The landslide caused residents’ houses to be buried, there were three houses that were uninhabited while the other two houses had residents. In fact, access from Manokwari Regency to Arfak Mountains Regency was completely paralyzed due to the main Trans West Papua Road being buried in the ground. “Yes, access was cut off because land blocked the main access,” he said.

There were five victims in the disaster, 4 people were found dead buried in the ground, while one other survived and was evacuated to the Warmare District First Hospital, Manokwari Regency. The Chair of the Provincial Parliament said that tactical disaster funds in West Papua must be budgeted, both by the West Papua Provincial Government and the district government in West Papua. “This natural disaster cannot be predicted, so Emergency Disaster Funds should be budgeted for,” said Orgenes Wonggor, chairman of the West Papua Provincial Parliament.

Wonggor said that in 2023 he learned that the disaster emergency budget was budgeted at around IDR 60 billion. “We don’t know how much this year but it will be diverted to regional head elections,” said Wonggor. Not only landslides in Minyambouw District, several days earlier several areas in West Papua were hit by hostile weather.

High intensity rain caused flooding which caused bridges to be cut off in Manokwari and the Arfak Mountains. Apart from that, dozens of houses were flooded in Teluk Bintuni Regency, Manokwari and in the Arfak Mountains, a number of main sections of the Trans West Papua road access were blocked by landslides. “The upper area has quite sloping topography so we have to sort out which locations can be planted by people and which are protected areas,” said Wonggor.

He said that the volume of landslides in the road area leading to South Manokwari Regency was small, so cleaning had been carried out. “But if you go via Minyambouw to Pegaf, it is completely cut off to this day,” he said. He said there were a number of roads damaged in the Arfak Mountains due to landslides. “There are many damaged roads, including the bridge at the Numow River which is also broken,” he said.