MEPPADI (WAYANAD): Trichy native A Shiva, 30, looks at the valley of mountains through a window from his room at Wayanad Institute of Medical Sciences (WIMS) at Meppadi, where he has been admitted since August 8.
One could see the fear and trauma in his eyes that narrate his miraculous escape after being caught in the landslide at Puthumala in Wayanad.
His swollen and bruised body reveals how lucky he was to escape from the clutches of death which took away his friend Karthik Selvam, a native of Pollachi. There is still no information about his four other friends - Gowri Shankar, Sathya Prakash, Ganesh Babu and Naveen, all from Pollachi.
“The incident occurred around 4.30 pm and I was sitting in a car charging my mobile phone, while others were standing outside. I heard a loud roaring sound and I didn’t have the time to react. Though I tried to open the car doors, I couldn’t as trees, stones and mud rammed the doors. The car was caught in the flow of the debris and swept away. The vehicle toppled to one side and I couldn’t see anything. Finally, the car hit the trunk of a tree and was fully covered with mud. I broke open the rear windshield of the car and managed to crawl out of the car,” Shiva recollected.
As he came out of the car, he could see the vast stretch of destruction and there was none in the vicinity. He slowly walked a kilometre to reach a road from where the locals picked him up and took him to WIMS.
“My friends were all here on vacation and to spend a few days with me. Naveen has just returned from Germany where he has been working,” said Shiva, who is working as a welfare officer at the tea estate.
“I hail from Perambaloor in Trichy and have been here for the last one year and staying at the quarters provided by my company at Puthumala,” he said.
“I was shrieking, and initially couldn’t understand what was happening. Only after I reached the hospital, I came to know that my friends were missing,” he said, adding that he hasn’t informed his family members about the incident.