Less than a month before the second anniversary of the 2024 Wayanad landslides which fundamentally altered public understanding of landslide risks in the country and killed 298 people while leaving many more injured and homeless, another mountain slope collapsed in Wayanad district of Kerala. This time, the slip occurred at the exit section of the under-construction Anakkampoyil-Kalladi-Meppadi twin tunnel project. On July 7, 2026, following intense monsoon rain, a massive slope failure hit the tunnel project near Meenakshi Bridge at Kalladi, near Meppadi. The incident was initially described as a mudslide because a large mass of waterlogged excavated earth swept through the construction site. It was later identified by experts and officials as a landslide that originated higher up the slope, with the accumulated tunnel spoil adding to its destructive force. The collapse buried workers, vehicles and equipment, killing seven people. Two others remained missing after days of search operations. Investigations in progress Investigators are also examining whether the failure was aggravated by the contractor’s alleged non-compliance with directions to remove the excavated soil accumulated near the site before the monsoon. As per the reading on the hyper-local rain gauge at the research institute, Hume Centre for Ecology and Wildlife Biology near the Kalladi-Meppadi tunnel corridor, the area received about 260 mm of rainfall over the preceding three days, saturating the already unstable hillside before the collapse. According to the district administration, the tragedy unfolded when earth, boulders and debris crashed onto the construction site, trapping workers engaged in the…This article was originally published on Mongabay
