Durban - “I did not think he was going to make it.” That was the reaction of the young mother who spent more than an hour watching community members and rescue workers dig for her 4-year-old son buried in a mudslide on Sunday.
Mpilo Ngidi escaped with just a badly sprained foot after soil and rocks washed away by heavy rains collapsed on to informal houses and fell on him at the Siyathokoza informal settlement in Sea Cow Lake, Durban.
At his aunt’s house in the Jamaica informal settlement on Monday, Mpilo seemed exhausted, but healthy.
Heavy rains caused extensive damage to informal structures and resulted in loss of life. At least six people died, including a 1-year-old child.
Speaking to The Mercury on Monday, Zinhle Ngidi, 18, said there were moments when it seemed her son would not make it out alive.
“The rescue was taking too long, but I was also fearful that they would not get to him in time.
“There were moments when I thought he was not going to make it. It helped that more people joined us. I was also there moving the rocks.
“Some people, however, were not willing to help. They walked by, saying they were in a rush to rescue their furniture that was being damaged by the rain,” she said.
Speaking of the events leading up to her son being buried under the mud, she recalled the details in horror.
“It had been raining the whole of Friday night, and even harder on Saturday. The room was leaking and the bed was soaked.
“I decided to sleep on the floor with my children because it was not leaking so heavily there.
“While sleeping, I heard a noise from outside, which was the neighbour’s house falling. I turned and looked outside through the cracks of the door, and all I saw were mud, rocks and houses coming down towards us.
“I grabbed my youngest child and tried to grab Mpilo by the arm, and before I could move anywhere it was dark. It all happened so fast, and the room we were in was gone.”
She said she looked around and found that Mpilo had been buried underneath the mud.
“I could hear him screaming, saying: Mommy come get me.'“
Community members, who were later joined by professional rescue services, worked frantically to get to the child.
“I was so relieved when they dug him out and he was alive. I wondered what I was going to say to my family had he not made it out alive.
“How could I tell them I saved myself, but failed to save my child?”
She said Mpilo was still feeling the effects.
“He is jittery, and he jumps up and cries often.”
Hero tells of rescue bid
Knowing that one day his own son might need help from a stranger was what pushed Constable Miya, a resident of the Siyathuthula informal settlement in Sea Cow Lake, to help rescue Mpilo.
Miya said he was on his way to church when he heard people screaming. When he went outside he saw transit camps and shacks being swept away by flood waters. He started helping people move their furniture.
“There was a guy who told me a child was trapped under a shack and there was sand and rocks on top of him. I stopped helping with the furniture and went to help rescue the child,” he said.
Miya called other men and they desperately started digging to get the child out.
They used spades, side-cutters to cut wires and their bare hands to remove rubble. They had to go through rocks, wires, masonite, blankets and pieces of furniture before getting to Mpilo.
He was working with another resident, Lucky Sibiya. It took them two hours to free the child.
“After some work, we saw the child’s head and the upper part of the body, but his lower part was still trapped,” he said. Miya said the child was crying and calling for help from his mother but there was a time where he was quiet and they feared that he might have died.
“I do not know this child and her mother but I felt pain for them. Everyone was busy saving their own and she had no one to help her. I thought about my own son who might need help one day and it would not be nice when people do not come to his rescue,” he said.
Paramedics arrived but could not get the child out. Miya and Sibiya continued digging until the child was freed.
Read more: Flood victim's hope for home lies buried
Miya said he was troubled the whole of Sunday night, worried about Mpilo’s well-being.
“At night I could hear his voice in my sleep. He was saying ‘uncle hold me, it is painful’ and I felt so bad,” he said.
On Monday morning he went to check on the child at Addington Hospital where he had been admitted.
Mpilo was discharged on Monday.
Miya continues to make contact with non-profit organisations to ask for any form of assistance for the people from his community.
@sphengubane
The Mercury