MEDAN, Indonesia, Nov 27, (AP): Rescuers searched Thursday in rivers and the rubble of villages for bodies, and when possible survivors, after flash floods and landslides on Indonesia’s Sumatra island left 49 people dead and 67 missing. Monsoon rains over the past week caused rivers to burst their banks in North Sumatra province Tuesday.

The deluge tore through mountainside village, swept away people and submerged more than 2,000 houses and buildings, the National Disaster Management Agency said. Nearly 5,000 residents fled to government shelters. Seventeen bodies were recovered by Thursday in South Tapanuli district and eight bodies in Sibolga city, North Sumatra provincial police’s spokesperson Ferry Walintukan said in a statement.

In the neighboring district of Central Tapanuli, landslides hit several homes, killing at least a family of four. Rescue workers also recovered two bodies in Pakpak Bharat district and were searching for five people reported missing in Humbang Hasundutan, another district devastated by landslides that killed two villagers, Walintukan said.

At least one resident died when mud and debris struck a main road on a tiny Nias island, he added. "With many missing and some remote areas still unreachable, the death toll was likely to rise,” Walintukan said. More downpours were forecast for North Sumatra province and the danger of extreme rainfall will continue until next week, Indonesia’s Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency said.

It recommended weather modification to reduce rain, and disaster agency chief Suharyanto said cloud seeding would be done to prevent further rainfall and floods. "We are deploying weather modification technology starting tomorrow so that rain does not fall during this emergency response period,” Suharyanto, who goes by a single name like many Indonesians, told reporters before visiting flood- and landslide-hit areas of Sibolga city on Thursday.

Cloud seeding involves dispersing particles into clouds to create precipitation, which would be done to redirect rainfall away from areas where search and rescue efforts were continuing. Television reports showed rescue personnel using jackhammers, circular saws, farm tools and sometimes their bare hands to dig in areas marked by thick mud, rocks and uprooted trees.