DUNGUN - A total of 90 tahfiz students and six teachers of Madrasah Darul Bayan Pondok Pinang Merah faced anxious moments when the building located near Sungai Paka, was suddenly flooded in an incident on Dec 20.
The head of the madrasah, Zulkifli Ilyas, 38, said at the time of the incident, all the students - 50 boys and 40 girls aged between seven and 18 - and their teachers were performing dawn prayers at the Kampung Pinang Merah Mosque, when the water from Sungai Paka began overflowing and rising quickly around the premises.
"The situation caused some of the students to have to wade through knee-deep water to return to the madrasah located next to the mosque to save their belongings.
"At the same time, older students also helped in terms of supervising the younger ones, while the students were evacuated in stages to the SK Kg Nyior relief centre using the madrasah’s boat," he said when met by Bernama at the relief centre.
He said that by 8 am, the water was flowing rapidly and had risen to a depth of 1.22 metres, which caused some trees located near the madrasah to fall, hitting the electric fuse box, after which he did not allow the students to return to the madrasa for fear of electrocution.
Zulkifli also described the floods this year as being worse than the big floods which occurred in 2004 and 2014 in the area.
"The floods previously rose to waist level, but this year, it rose to chest level... Alhamdulilah, we did not suffer any mishaps. The teachers' vehicles were also able to be saved, but some of the school furniture could not be salvaged," he said.
He added that the flood this time caused the madrasa to suffer a loss of over RM30,000 due to infrastructure damage.
Meanwhile, one of the students, Hafiz Akmal Shaari, 18, said he and his friend could only rely on Allah and hope that everything would be safe while helping to transfer fellow students to the relief centre.
"At the time, both of us had to brave up and row the boat through the strong currents, going back and forth several times to send the other students to the relief centre which is located about six kilometres from the madrasah.
"Alhamdulillah, everyone is safe, and it’s an experience I will never forget," said Hafiz Akmal. - BERNAMA