Maltese soldiers and rescuers lending a hand in flood-stricken Derna have so far recovered 12 bodies but no survivors, a spokesperson for the Home Affairs Ministry said on Friday.

The Maltese team has so far been involved in four missions - one on Thursday and three missions on Friday, Home Affairs Minister Byron Camilleri said. 

Derna was devastated when it was swept by a tsunami-sized flash flood on Sunday night. The town's mayor, Abdel-Moneim al-Ghaithi, has been reported saying that the death toll has soared to 11,300 and could climb to 20,000 given the number of neighbourhoods that were washed out.

Search and rescue workers from Malta arrived in the coastal city on Thursday morning.  

“The Maltese are in the most badly hit part of Derna, at the side of the port,” Home Affairs Minister Byron Camilleri said on Friday.   

Their first job on Thursday was to search for survivors and bodies under destroyed bridges and buildings, Camilleri said.   

“These are places where Libyan authorities could not access before professional rescue workers from Malta and other countries arrived,” he said.

Unfortunately, no one - dead or alive -  was found in that exercise, Camilleri said.   

A team from the Civil Protection Department and the Armed Forces are helping in flood ridden Derna. Photo: Civil Protection Department

On Friday, the Maltese rescuers and soldiers were responsible for three missions, the home affairs minister said.   

One involves recovering seven dead bodies; another is a search for eight missing people in a devastated house, and the third is to try to save people spotted on drone footage taken 13 kilometres off the coast.

In this footage, 60 people were seen on the surface, Camilleri said. 

“The Maltese team is to find the people and save them if they are found alive. If they are unfortunately found dead, they will bring the bodies back so that they can be buried according to the country’s (Libya) culture.”

Sources told Times of Malta that the Maltese team has so far recovered 12 corpses but no survivors. 

The Maltese search and rescue workers consist of 12 AFM officers, including a medical team and 31 members of the CPD. They were taken to Libya by the 30 crew members who steered a P61 patrol boat from Malta to Benghazi.   

From Benghazi, search and rescue workers travelled eight hours to Derna.   

“The journey took a long time because many of the roads were destroyed,” Camilleri said.   

Contact with the Maltese contingent is limited as communication services in Derna were also destroyed in the disaster, Camilleri said.