lawyerlee
02-17-2006, 12:05 PM
Hundreds Feared Dead in Landslide in Philippines (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/17/international/asia/17cnd-mud.html?ei=5094&en=e2f29b28977089a4&hp=&ex=1140238800&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print)
New York Times
By JOHN O'NEIL and CARLOS CONDE
A landslide wiped out a village in the Philippines today, burying hundreds of homes and an elementary school in up to 30 feet of mud, according to local officials.
As the rescue effort ended for the night, 53 survivors had been pulled from the wreckage of the farming village of Guinsaugon on Leyte Island in the central Philippines, and 19 bodies had been recovered, the governor of the region, Rosette Larias, said in a televised interview.
She said that about 1,400 people were missing.
Rescuers held out little hope of finding many more survivors in the plain of mud that stretched across the site of the village, at the foot of a mountain whose side gave way after two weeks of heavy rain.
Richard Gordon, the head of the Philippines Red Cross, said that only three of the village's 300 homes were still standing. Mr. Gordon spoke with news service reporters from Geneva after being briefed by rescuers.
"One hundred percent of the area is completely covered with mud," he said.
About 200 students were in the school when the landslide hit shortly before 10 a.m., and about 100 visitors had come to the village of 2,500 to attend a meeting of a women's group, news services said. Local officials said they believed that most of the dead would be the women and children who stayed in the village while many of its men left to go to work.
New York Times
By JOHN O'NEIL and CARLOS CONDE
A landslide wiped out a village in the Philippines today, burying hundreds of homes and an elementary school in up to 30 feet of mud, according to local officials.
As the rescue effort ended for the night, 53 survivors had been pulled from the wreckage of the farming village of Guinsaugon on Leyte Island in the central Philippines, and 19 bodies had been recovered, the governor of the region, Rosette Larias, said in a televised interview.
She said that about 1,400 people were missing.
Rescuers held out little hope of finding many more survivors in the plain of mud that stretched across the site of the village, at the foot of a mountain whose side gave way after two weeks of heavy rain.
Richard Gordon, the head of the Philippines Red Cross, said that only three of the village's 300 homes were still standing. Mr. Gordon spoke with news service reporters from Geneva after being briefed by rescuers.
"One hundred percent of the area is completely covered with mud," he said.
About 200 students were in the school when the landslide hit shortly before 10 a.m., and about 100 visitors had come to the village of 2,500 to attend a meeting of a women's group, news services said. Local officials said they believed that most of the dead would be the women and children who stayed in the village while many of its men left to go to work.