Death Toll from Quarry Collapse in Indonesia Rises to 14

Alsharq Tribune- Zainab Hussin 

At least 14 people were killed after a quarry collapsed the previous day in Indonesia’s West Java province, officials said Saturday. More than two dozen people were trapped in the rubble when the Gunung Kuda quarry in Cirebon district collapsed on Friday.

Rescuers pulled a dozen injured people and 10 bodies from the debris during a grueling search effort. They retrieved three more bodies late Friday, and another worker died in hospital, bringing the death toll to 14, said the National Search and Rescue Agency in a statement.

Five people have been hospitalized with serious injuries. Local television reports showed emergency personnel, along with police, soldiers and volunteers digging desperately in the quarry in a steep limestone cliff, supported by five excavators, early Saturday.

Authorities said six to eight people are still believed to be trapped, The Associated Press reported. The cause of the collapse is still under investigation, and police have been questioning six people including the owner of the quarry, said local police chief Sumarni.

West Java Governor Dedi Mulyadi said in a video statement on Instagram that he visited the quarry before he was elected in February and considered it dangerous. “It did not meet the safety standard elements for its workers,” Mulyadi said, adding that at that time, “I didn’t have any capacity to stop it.” On Friday, Mulyadi said that he had ordered the quarry shut, as well as four other similar sites in West Java.

Illegal or informal resource extraction operations are common in Indonesia, providing a tenuous livelihood to those who labor in conditions with a high risk of injury or death. Landslides, flooding and tunnel collapses are just some of the hazards associated with them.

Much of the processing of sand, rocks or gold ore also involves the use of highly toxic mercury and cyanide by workers using little or no protection. Last year, a landslide triggered by torrential rains struck an unauthorized gold mining operation on Indonesia’s Sumatra island, killing at least 15 people.