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Around 1,200 people are still being evacuated from their homes after the landslide in Gjerdrum on Wednesday morning.
Meanwhile, the municipality is working on planning how to put the infrastructure back in place.
The main water pipe was destroyed in the landslide, but most of the water supply is now in place with temporary fixes. The municipality asks people to use as little water as possible and to boil it before drinking.
Sewage crisis
But for the sewer, it is not so easy to improvise.
– Now all wastewater, including wastewater, flows into the immediate area, into the waterways and the terrain. We can’t do anything and we don’t have quick fixes, says Ken Wiik, business manager for technical services in Gjerdrum municipality.
Wiik says the municipality is working very hard to design a new sewer line. There will be a 1.5 kilometer long main line on the ground, around the landslide area.
– But it will be quickly seven to nine days before we get a sewer line installed, says Wiik.
Meanwhile, shit and effluent accumulate on the ground.
– We receive help from the Civil Defense and we use truck pumps that suck it up, so there are no lakes around.
Justaf Ciginskas and Tommy Andersen (right) work at the water station outside the culture house at the Ask center in Gjerdrum. They draw water from people.
Photo: Thomas Marthinsen / NRK
The path has less than ten meters of clay.
The main road from the south to Ask en Gjerdrum is closed after the landslide. It will be a long time before County Highway 120 reopens.
– It will be closed for a long, long time, for many, many months, says Wiik.
The path is more than ten meters below with clay that floated when the avalanche passed.
– We estimate that the layer of mud is ten meters high. There are many thousands of cubic meters across the road, it’s a large area, says Wiik.
For more information on this, see the website of the municipality and the website of the Norwegian Public Roads Administration.
I was early to disconnect the power
Tore Tuneid is Elvia’s Operations Manager.
Photo: Fouad Acharcki / NRK
More than 2,000 homes were in a period without power after the landslide.
Elviaformerly Hafslund) was placed early in the area of the landslide to disconnect power, so it should be safe for search teams and emergency services.
– Several high voltage lines have disappeared in the avalanche along with several cables and substations, says Tore Tuneid, who is operations manager at Elvia.
During the first 24 hours, the utility company was able to turn off units and thus provide electricity to most homes.
Subsequently, temporary high-voltage cables were laid on the ground, so that the center of Ask and the southern part of Gjerdrum also regained power.
– Our job now is to secure the cables so that it is safe for people to travel in the area, says Tuneid, Monday morning.
I keep working in the red zone
Some homes still lack electricity. It is also unclear what should be done in the houses that remain after the landslide.
– There is a continuous dialogue that we have with the firefighters, the police and the other emergency services. But we don’t have an overview of what has been destroyed and what we can do. It’s an ongoing process, says Tuneid.
Tuneid crews are now working within the red zone in the landslide area.
Here, Elvia’s teams work in the landslide zone.
Ten kilometers of barrier tape
Efforts are also being made to block the area with fences so that people do not get too close. According to the municipality, more than 10 kilometers of barrier tape have already been used. Now there will be fences.
– It is scheduled to be completed today, so there will be a controllable situation when the municipality is more responsible alone, says commercial technical manager Ken Wiik.
