Timah Workers In Pangkalpinang Bebel Reported Missing After Being Attacked By Crocodiles

Illustration of estuarine crocodiles in captivity (ANTARA)

PANGKALPINANG - Pangkalpinang Search and Rescue Office (SAR) is conducting a search for tin miners from Banten Village, Belitung Regency, Bangka Belitung Province (Babel), who disappeared after being attacked by a crocodile on the edge of the Berang River Dusun Air Malik.

Head of the Pangkalpinang SAR Office I Made Oka Astawa in a statement who said that his party received information about the incident that happened to a tin miner named Heri (25 years old) on Tuesday night.

Oka revealed that the victim was missing after being attacked by a crocodile after finishing working on mining lead and when he was about to head to the river to wash his feet, suddenly he was attacked by a crocodile and pulled into the middle of the river.

"The incident was witnessed directly by the victim's father-in-law, who at that time was not far from the victim," said Oka.

Seeing the incident, said Oka, the victim's mother-in-law asked local residents for help and tried to search for victims who were attacked by crocodiles along the river.

"However, until 21.32 WIB the search for victims was fruitless. Then residents reported the incident to the Pangkalpinang SAR Office," he said.

Receiving this information, he continued, the Pangkalpinang SAR Office dispatched a rescue team to the location of the incident in the Berang River, Air Malik Hamlet, Bantan Village, Belitung.

Arriving at the location of the Joint SAR Team consisting of Rescuer Pos SAR Belitung, Rescuer USS Tanjungpandan, TNI AU and the community, they tried to search for victims.

Due to the location of the incident which has many tin mining and long river flows, the Pangkalpinang SAR Office deployed a Drone Macic 3 Thermal to facilitate the search for victims. The drone has the ability to search at night with the thermal feature.

"However, until 23.47 WIB last night (Tuesday night), the search for victims has not yielded results. We plan to continue the search in the morning with the joint SAR Team. Hopefully, efforts to search for victims can produce results and victims can be found as soon as possible," explained Oka.