The Japan Times - Toll in floods ravaging Southeast Asia tops 150

Heavy rains across Indonesia, Malaysia and southern Thailand have inundated cities, trapped thousands and caused deadly landslides.

Authorities were scrambling to reach people stranded in floodwater-filled homes or cut off entirely by debris that has blocked roads and taken out communications and electricity.

On Indonesia's Sumatra island, officials said flooding and landslides this week have killed at least 111 people, with nearly 100 more missing.

North Sumatra police spokesman Ferry Walintukan said authorities were focused on "evacuation and providing assistance".

Access to some areas and communication was still cut off, he told AFP.

"Hopefully, the weather will clear up so we can move the helicopter to the (worst-hit) locations."

In North Sumatra's Medan, an AFP photographer saw murky brown floodwaters at hip level, and residents asking drivers passing their inundated homes to drive slowly to avoid splashing them.

Some residents donned rain ponchos and motorbike helmets to protect themselves from the rain as they traversed flooded streets.

- 'Didn't sleep at all' -

In West Sumatra, 53-year-old Misniati described a terrifying battle against rising floodwaters to reach her husband at home.

Returning from early morning prayers at a local mosque, "I noticed the street was flooded."

"I tried to run back to my house to tell my husband, and the water was already reaching my waist," she told AFP.

She battled currents that nearly knocked her off her feet, and arrived home to find the water at chest level.

"We didn't sleep at all last night, we just monitored the water," said Misniati, who only uses one name.

The annual monsoon season, typically between June and September, often brings heavy rains, triggering landslides and flash floods.

It has been exacerbated by a tropical storm in the region in recent days.

Climate change also has impacted storm patterns, including the duration and intensity of the season, leading to heavier rainfall, flash flooding and stronger wind gusts.

A warmer climate holds more moisture, producing more intense rain events, while warmer oceans can turbocharge the strength of storm systems.

Conservation experts said overdevelopment was also to blame for flooding and landslides.

"If forest cover continues to decrease and is replaced by monoculture palm oil plantations, mining, and other activities, our ecological system will lose its ability to regulate water systems," said Uli Arta Siagian, campaigner at Indonesian environmental group WALHI.

- 'Nothing I could do' -

Among the hardest-hit areas in the region is southern Thailand, where flooding left residents of Hat Yai clinging to rooftops awaiting rescue by boat.

At least 55 people have been killed in the surrounding Songkhla province, and the region's main morgue said Friday it had no more room to receive bodies and was now relying on refrigerated trucks.

"The morgue has exceeded its capacity, so we need more," Charn, a morgue official at Songkhla Hospital who only gave his first name, told AFP.

An AFP journalist filmed white refrigerated trucks parked outside the hospital's main building.

Residents on Thursday described floodwaters rising rapidly.

"The water rose to the ceiling of the second floor," Kamban Wongpanya, 67, told AFP, explaining that she had to be rescued by boat.

Shop owner Chayaphol Promkleng thought at first that his business would be spared because flooding was "only ankle-deep".

He returned the following day to find his shop "flooded to waist-deep level".

"There was nothing I could do. I left the shop to save my life."

The government said Friday it had suspended Hat Yai's district chief over an alleged failure to respond to the flooding.

In Malaysia, two people have been killed in flooding caused by heavy rain that left stretches of northern Perlis state underwater.

The same weather system that passed through Indonesia, now downgraded from a tropical storm to a depression, made landfall early on Friday morning, dumping more rain on the already-sodden region.

burs-sah/tc

S.Yamamoto--JT