Avalanches Kill Dozens on Mountain Highway in Afghanistan

Avalanches Kill Dozens on Mountain Highway in Afghanistan
By ROD NORDLAND
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 9, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/10/world/asia/10avalanche.html?hpw


KABUL, Afghanistan — Heavy winds and rain set off 17 avalanches that buried more than two miles of highway at a high-altitude pass in the Hindu Kush mountain range, entombing hundreds of cars and cutting off Kabul’s heavily traveled link to northern Afghanistan, officials said Tuesday.

Calculations of the death toll ranged widely, but official accounts said that at least 64 people were either known or feared dead and that the total could rise as rescuers dug their way to vehicles trapped under hundreds of tons of snow and ice.

The interior minister, Mohammad Hanif Atmar, said that nearly a mile of the highway remained buried as of Tuesday evening. He added that the authorities had recovered 24 bodies, and that rescuers had already moved out 128 injured people.

“There could be up to 40 more still stranded, and unfortunately they may have died already,” Mr. Atmar said.

In its own calculation, the Ministry of Defense said in a statement that 30 people had been confirmed dead so far.

The calamity began Monday at the southern approaches of the 12,000-foot-high Salang Pass, just south of a tunnel through the mountains, which connects Kabul with northern Afghanistan. Mr. Atmar said a storm with heavy wind and rain blew in suddenly during the afternoon, setting off a series of avalanches above the highway, which is cut into mountainsides and often runs high above a river gorge.

The avalanches buried many cars and shoved others over the precipice deep into the gorge, said the defense minister, Rahim Wardak. Hundreds of other cars were trapped inside the nearly two-mile-long tunnel.

The Afghan National Army sent 500 troops to help the police with rescue efforts, while President Hamid Karzai ordered officials “to use all possible means to get the roads unblocked and rescue those trapped and stranded in the heavy snow,” according to a statement issued by his office.

NATO and Afghan National Army helicopters joined in the effort. About 2,500 people were recovered from their stranded cars, and 1.5 miles of roads were cleared Tuesday, leaving another mile still buried when work finished for the night.

Mr. Atmar issued an appeal for anyone with heavy equipment capable of moving snow to rent it to the government because the authorities did not have enough of their own.

He said the storm’s speed and ferocity had left no time to close the busy highway. “It happened all of a sudden, and it took us by surprise,” he said.

Many of the victims were taken to Parwan Hospital, in nearby Charikar, suffering from injuries and exposure. Among them were 11 children separated from their families by the avalanches, Mr. Atmar said.

Afghan news reports said people trapped inside the tunnel were calling for help on cellphones, saying they were freezing to death and choking on exhaust fumes.

The general director of Afghanistan’s National Disaster Management Authority, Abdul Matin Adrak, reached by telephone at Parwan Hospital, said hundreds of cars, buses and trucks remained trapped inside the tunnel or buried under the uncleared mile of road.

The Salang Pass tunnel, built by the Soviets in the 1960s, has a long history of fatal disasters, including fires, explosions and mass asphyxiation in the narrow, heavily traveled and poorly ventilated tunnel.

Elsewhere in Afghanistan, four NATO soldiers were killed in separate episodes on Tuesday. An American was killed by a roadside bomb in southern Afghanistan, and two soldiers of unidentified nationality were killed by another roadside bomb in southern Afghanistan, NATO’s International Security Assistance Force said in news releases. In addition, a French soldier was killed Tuesday in a firefight with insurgents in eastern Afghanistan, according to a statement from President Nicolas Sarkozy’s office. The soldier had been part of a French Army unit escorting an Afghan National Army convoy in Kapisa Province, the statement said.

The international forces did not reveal where in southern Afghanistan the two deadly events took place.

NATO and Afghan forces are preparing a major operation in the south intended to oust the Taliban insurgents from their stronghold in the town of Marja, in Helmand Province.

The international forces said in a statement Tuesday that commanders in Helmand Province were encouraging civilians to remain in their homes in the area of the operation.

Abdul Waheed Wafa contributed reporting.