Two cars were badly damaged after a landslide buried them near the Leisure Bay Condominium along Jalan Tanjung Tokong in Tanjung Bungah on Sunday evening. No one was involved in the incident, initial checks found.
John Sagun Francis, assistant director of the Penang fire and rescue department’s operations and firefighting division, said the emergency call came at 6.50pm, according to Bernama, and a team from the Bagan Jermal fire and rescue station reached the scene at 7pm.
“Initial checks found that no one was involved in the incident,” he said in a statement.
Six personnel, including a supervisor, are at the site with a Fire Rescue Tender, with police assisting. Rescue and monitoring work was still running at 7.45pm, and the cause of the slide is under investigation.
The incident followed a separate landslide at Taman Seri Rambai in Paya Terubong the same morning, which killed a 73-year-old doctor, FMT reported. Heavy rain the night before had also set off flash floods on both the island and the mainland, including in Bayan Lepas, Bayan Baru, Seberang Jaya, Ampang Jajar and Bukit Mertajam.
The meteorological department has issued a continuous rain warning for Penang, Perlis, Kedah and Perak until Monday.
A continuous rain warning differs from a thunderstorm alert. It is issued when rain is expected to fall steadily for hours, the condition that soaks hillsides and loosens the soil above roads, car parks and homes. Slope failures in Penang are usually recorded during the inter-monsoon and northeast monsoon months, when the ground on the island’s hills is already holding water.
Properties built against slopes carry the first signs. New cracks in the ground, tilting trees or utility poles, doors and windows that suddenly stick, and muddy water running where it normally does not are all reasons to move clear and call 999.
Fire and rescue teams typically stay on site after a slide until the slope has been checked and the debris declared stable. In this case, the two cars remain buried while the assessment continues.
Jalan Tanjung Tokong links George Town to Tanjung Bungah along the island’s northern coast, with condominiums, shops and car parks set against the hills that rise behind the road. The Leisure Bay Condominium sits off that stretch, close to the slope that came down on Sunday evening, and the two damaged cars were parked beside the building.
