Relief was launched on Tuesday in a race against time in southern Ecuador to find survivors after a landslide caused by heavy rains that left at least 7 dead and 62 missing, according to the latest report.
After torrential rains that occurred overnight from Sunday to Monday, several dozen houses were buried by a mudslide in Alausi, a locality in the province of Chimborazo, about 300 km south of Quito, in an Andean area struck last week by an earthquake that killed 15 people, including one in neighboring Peru.
“Five (my family members) are buried here,” Manuel Upai, a 40-year-old farmer and mason, who continued to search for his in-laws in the rubble in Alausi on Monday, told AFP.
“I regret that seven people died and that 62 people are still missing,” Ecuadorian President Guillermo Lasso said Monday evening when he arrived at the scene.
“We will continue to carry out rescue operations,” assured Mr. Lasso. In the disaster area, some 600 houses spared by the landslide were evacuated on the orders of the authorities.
Images broadcast by local media showed dozens of rescuers and civilians bustling around the debris to try to free buried people, in a ballet of ambulances with flashing lights and screaming sirens.
A massive brownish mudslide suddenly descended from the verdant mountains that surround Alausi, home to some 45,000 people. In the disaster area, survivors in tears and with tearful faces await news of their missing loved ones.
From the early hours of Monday morning, rescue teams were on the job looking for the slightest sign of life under the rubble.
The “fatal sound” of the mountainside breaking away still echoes in the mind of Maria Villa, 46, who escaped from her home through a window with her husband and daughter.
“I was preparing to eat (…) and I heard a noise,” she told AFP, frightened. Her husband immediately shouted, “The hill is crumbling.”
Maria acknowledges that the authorities had recommended that her family leave the area, which was classified as “yellow alert” in February due to the risk of landslides after severe weather.
“This week they advised us to leave, but the truth is that it hurts to leave our things behind. I know life has more value, but it’s such a strong pain”, she confides.
The authorities had also warned of a possible collapse of the E35 road in the Casual sector, where part of the mountain had broken away.
According to the National Secretariat for Risk Management (SNGR), nearly 500 people in total were affected by the flow.
The Chimborazo governor’s office said it was preparing food collection centers to help those affected. The armed forces take part in relief operations and in the transport of material to build temporary shelters.
For its part, the local Red Cross provided “pre-hospital care” to the victims. Residents of nearby villages also arrived in the early hours of the morning to assist in the rescue operations.
The city of Alausi is known worldwide for the “Devil’s Nose”, a steep slope through which passes the Trans-Andean railway line of Ecuador, a section nicknamed the “most difficult train in the world” due to its dangerousness.
Since January, heavy rains have already left 22 dead and 346 homeless in the country. More than 6,900 homes were damaged and 72 were destroyed, authorities said. Some 987 incidents were caused by bad weather, such as floods and landslides.
In February, rains led to a five-day suspension of crude oil pumping as a pipeline threatened to burst after a bridge collapsed.
28/03/2023 10:13:24 – Alausí (Ecuador) (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
