(Dosquebradas) At least 11 people perished Tuesday in a landslide in a locality in the center west of Colombia, according to the latest official report.
Posted at 3:21 p.m.
Updated at 3:36 p.m.
Heavy rains caused at dawn the collapse of a mountain section on summary dwellings in the locality of Dosquebradas, in the department of Risaralda.
Rescuers from the National Unit for Disaster Risk Management reported in the early afternoon on Twitter a balance sheet of 11 dead and 35 injured.
A previous report deplored seven dead and 29 injured.
“There was a frightening noise, like a loud bang. We got out and saw the mountainside that had buried houses, ”explains Dubernei Hernandez, a 42-year-old taxi driver, a neighbor of the disaster site.
“I went there and it was a disaster, people were trapped” under the ground, explained the resident who says he participated in first aid.
Aerial images taken by AFP show rescuers still searching for bodies that could be buried under the mud, and the remains of houses with pulverized sheet metal roofs.
Relief is said to fear possible new landslides, several families have been evacuated as a precaution.
“We are currently managing the entire evacuation perimeter because we are still detecting instability in the terrain,” department official Alvaro Arias said on local radio.