Continuous, heavy downpours in Maharashtra caused a severe landslide in the Pune district early Monday morning, resulting in the deaths of three family members after debris buried multiple homes. The disaster also severely impacted transportation, halting traffic on both the Mumbai-Pune Expressway and the old Mumbai-Pune Highway, as officials were forced to shut down these vital routes connecting the two major cities.
Nandu Tikone (60), Mauli Tikone (30), and Anita Tikone (55) have been identified as the victims.
In Patan village in Maval tehsil, a section of a slope fell, burying about five houses, according to authorities. About 30 to 35 individuals were trapped beneath the rubble after a section of a mountain toppled upon village homes at 4:25 in the morning. While efforts to retrieve the third corpse are ongoing and debris clearance work is in progress, NDRF workers have already found two bodies.
An NDRF spokesman stated, “The body of one person has been recovered from the debris, and the search is underway for the other two,” according to news agency PTI.
Three landslides happened in the isolated village after a lot of rain, according to Deputy Superintendent of Police (Lonavala division) Gajanan Tompe.
“A home was buried in the rubble in one of the occurrences. When the avalanche happened early on Monday morning, three people were inside the house,” he added. The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) was contacted immediately after a distress call, according to the District Information Office. According to news outlet ANI, a specialized 30-person squad from the NDRF’s 5th Battalion, which is located in Pune, was promptly sent to Patan village.
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