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| Situation Update No. 3 Ref.no.: AV-20100218-24982-PAK
Situation Update No. 3
On 2010-02-19 at 05:07:16 [UTC]
Event: Avalanche
Location: Pakistan Province of North-West Frontier Kohistan District
Number of Deads: 35 person(s)
Number of Missing: 17 person(s)
Situation: Pakistani officials said on Thursday that 35 people were killed while 17 were missing after a large avalanche hit an alpine hamlet in the north-western district of Kohistan. Saifur Rehman, the mayor of Kohistan district, said that a cluster of houses in the Bagrodara village of Kohistan's Kundia area were buried by the avalanche, which struck on Wednesday. "So far we have recovered 35 bodies and we fear that 17 more are still buried under the snow," said Rehman. "Quite a long time has passed and we can only pray that those buried under the snow are still alive." The rescue efforts took several hours to start as there are no roads to the affected village. Policemen and volunteers had to hike through the night to reach the scene. "The people had to walk on more than five feet thick snow to reach the village," said Rehman. Kohistan police chief Mohammad Ilyas said the police were facing communication problems as radio reception was hampered by the mountainous terrain. Pakistan's north-western region received heavy snowfall earlier this month after a prolonged dry spell, which had been threatening drought conditions in many areas. |  | | | |
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