Residents in Sudan’s Jebel Marra are attempting to recover hundreds of bodies with scant equipment after a landslide buried the village of Tarsin on Sunday, August 31. Community leaders are urging the rapid deployment of UN emergency teams to contain the disaster.
The civil administration aligned with the Sudan Liberation Movement–Abdel Wahid (SLM-AW) said all of Tarsin’s roughly 1,000 residents were killed when torrents from days of heavy rain triggered the slide. The figure could not be independently verified.
Adam Regal, spokesperson for the General Coordination of IDPs and Refugees in Darfur, appealed to local and international organizations for urgent assistance to families of the dead and those affected.
Community elder Adam Mohammed Adam said hundreds of bodies remain under the rubble, while neighboring villagers are trying to assist rescue efforts despite a lack of proper tools. Fathi Mohammed Ali, who lost relatives in the disaster, said he learned of their deaths via social media after communications to the area were cut.
Tarsin lies in the Amo administrative unit of Central Jebel Marra, ringed by mountains and reachable only by climbing narrow approaches. Residents farm fragile soils during the rainy season. The village has a mosque, a Quranic school and a small market, and is known for citrus and mango orchards; most homes are built from local stone. Before the slide, Tarsin was hosting hundreds of people displaced from Zamzam, Abshok and other parts of Sudan.
A similar landslide in Tarba, east of Jebel Marra, killed and injured hundreds in 2018.
