KUALA KUBU BARU (Malaysia) - TWO sisters were buried alive when a landslide hit their bungalow in Ulu Yam Perdana near here early on Sunday.

Noratirah Roslan, 16, and Nurul Intan Sarina, nine, were sleeping in their bedroom when the hillside at the back of their house collapsed, sending tonnes of rubble and soil crashing onto the single-storey house in Jalan Belida 1 at 5.30am.

Their parents Mr Roslan Mohd Jalil, 49, and Ms Azizan Madon, 42, and three siblings - Norlisa Azira, eight, Anis Afina, six, and Norman Afiq, three, who were sleeping in the living room - were unhurt.

A rescue team retrieved Noratirah's body at 12.30pm and Nurul Intan's body at 3.30pm.

Some 140 personnel from the police, Smart, Fire and Rescue Department, Civil Defence Department, Tenaga Nasional Bhd, Rela, Malaysian Red Crescent Society and staff members of the district office here were involved in the search.

Ms Azizan said the landslide occurred very fast.

'I heard a loud bang at the back of the house and then I saw rubble and soil crashing onto the house.'

'I crawled out of the house through the damaged roof and sought help from a resort nearby. My husband and three children also managed to get out of the house through the roof,' she said.

She said it was the first landslide in the area since they moved into the bungalow seven years ago.

Her husband, a pilot with Firefly, was to have flown to Koh Samui, Thailand, on Sunday morning.

Hulu Selangor Public Order chief ASP Zaldino Zaludin said the house and two cars - a Perodua Kancil and a Kia Spectra - were destroyed.

'The incident could have been caused by heavy rain,' he said.

Hulu Selangor district officer Nor Hisham Dahlan did not rule out the possibility that logging activities and a quarry operation nearby may have destabilised the soil in the area.

The Darul Selangor Foundation is providing shelter to the family at a hotel nearby. -- BERNAMA