More than 40 people have been buried in a landslide in southwest China’s Yunnan province. According to Chinese state media, according to initial findings, the authorities assumed 47 people were missing. Two people were rescued dead from the rubble early Monday afternoon (local time), Chinese state television reported.
The masses of earth hit the village of Liangshui in the north of the province, where a few thousand people live, early in the morning. Authorities evacuated more than 200 people from the area, according to state news agency Xinhua. It is still unclear how many people died in the accident.
State television showed images of a path that the avalanche had torn through the mountainside and footage of rescue workers searching for people in the rubble. At around midday the station reported that the helpers had found a survivor. One of the reporters said by telephone that the accident occurred while it was still dark. The buried houses were all built on a steep slope.
According to reports, civil protection and the fire department arrived with dozens of vehicles and hundreds of helpers. According to the People’s Daily, soldiers were also sent to the area in Zhenxiong county, which borders Sichuan and Guizhou provinces in northeastern Yunnan. It was initially unclear how the landslide occurred. On Monday the temperature at the scene of the accident was around freezing point. It had snowed the night before.
Xinhua reported that the local government has launched further relief measures. According to the party mouthpiece, China’s state and party leader Xi Jinping called from Beijing to quickly organize rescue workers and do all they can to help the missing. He also called for early warning to be strengthened in order to prevent further disasters.
