The death toll from landslides in India’s Kerala has reached 93, with 128 others hospitalized, the southern state’s Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has told reporters, Ednews informs.

“93 dead bodies have been found so far,” Vijayan said on Tuesday. “128 people are under treatment in hospitals… This is one of the worst natural calamities that our state has seen.”

Landslides triggered by relentless monsoon rains struck tea plantations in the district of Wayanad at about 2 am on Tuesday (20:30 GMT on Monday), as heavy rain collapsed hillsides and triggered torrents of mud, water, and tumbling boulders.

The landslides cut off at least four villages in the district, with rescue efforts hampered by continued rains and blocked roads. Most of the victims were tea estate workers and their families who were asleep in makeshift shelters.

Wayanad is famed for the tea estates crisscrossing its hilly countryside which rely on a large pool of casual labourers for planting and harvest.

Nearly 350 families lived in the affected region, mostly given over to tea and cardamom estates, and 250 people had been rescued so far, state officials said.

Army engineers were deployed to help build a replacement bridge after the one that linked the affected area to the nearest town of Chooralmala was destroyed, the chief minister’s office said in a statement.