The village of Aab Barik was buried by a tide of rock and mud last Friday after heavy rains. The government confirmed 300 deaths, and has given up looking for 2,100 missing. Hundreds of homes are now underneath 300ft of mud, and families are staying in tents from aid agencies. Villagers spoke of their grief at losing husbands, wives and children as their homes were destroyed in moments. Andrew Morris, chief of Unicef for the Northern Region of Afghanistan, said, 'The whole area has been declared a burial ground; our staff described it in some places to be as deep as 50 metres of mud. Our first priority is getting water supplies going and we are urgently looking at sanitation. Then we have to help children to overcome this traumatic event. We have got to get them back to school as soon as we can. That is part of the return to normalcy.'