At least 26 dead in Guatemala mudslide, hundreds missing

A rain-sodden hillside about 300 feet (100 meters) high collapsed onto a neighborhood on the outskirts of Guatemala’s capital with a roar and wave of sudden darkness, killing at least 26 people and sending 36 to hospitals. Family members have reported 100 people missing, but the number could be as high as 600 based on at least 100 homes in the area of the slide, said Alejandro Maldonado, executive secretary of Conred, the country’s emergency disaster agency.

Hundreds of rescue workers used shovels and backhoes in a desperate effort to reach survivors Friday, pulling one man alive from the rubble of his collapsed home more than 15 hours after the landslide hit late Thursday. Julio Sanchez, spokesman for Guatemala’s volunteer firefighters, said the dead, including two babies, were carried to an improvised morgue where weeping relatives identified their bodies, and families had shown up looking for people who hadn’t been accounted for.

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Source:Indianexpress

Guatemala Mudslide