93 missing in landslide
Over 1,000 rescuers on site to search for signs of life
Rescuers have recovered 10 bodies from a massive landslide in Southwest China’s Sichuan Province where 93 people remain missing, the local government said.
Fifteen people were con- firmed safe after the government released a list of 118 missing people, the Maoxian county emergency office told the Global Times Sunday.
Those missing include a 3- year- old and an 83- year- old, the Xinhua News Agency reported.
It said that the landslide from a mountain in the Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture of Aba hit Xinmo village in Maoxian county at about 6 am on Saturday, blocking a two-kilometer section of a river and burying 1.6 kilometers meters of road. A villager surnamed Dai from Lianghekou village, which sits opposite Xinmo, told the Global Times on Sunday it had rained continuously for two days before the landslide happened. “I woke up early in the morning
on Saturday because my house was shaking heavily. I thought it was another earthquake, but when I looked out of the window I saw the village [ Xinmo] shrouded in smoke. When the smoke disappeared, the village was gone,” Dai said.
A 16- year- old girl surnamed Wang, who escaped the disaster because she was in school in Maoxian county, insisted on returning to Xinmo on Sunday after she failed to reach her parents.
“I need to see their bodies even if they are already dead,” she said. Wang refused to leave and remained where her house used to be.
Following the disaster, President Xi Jinping ordered all- out rescue efforts for those buried by the landslide, Xinhua reported on Saturday, quoting Xi as saying that authorities must make maximum efforts to reduce casualties and prevent secondary disasters.
Family members of the missing people and those suffering from the disaster must be given appropriate care, Xi said.
Premier Li Keqiang also said that related departments need to investigate the disaster, relocate residents and prevent serious secondary disasters from happening.
Sichuan and Aba prefecture authorities have launched the highest level of disaster relief response, and rescue work is underway. Search and rescue operations were conducted overnight and experts were sent to examine potential secondary disasters on Saturday, Xinhua said.
Xinhua reported that more than 1,000 rescuers with excavators and life detection instruments went to the site to conduct rescue work on Saturday.
A rescuer surnamed Jin from a local hospital told the Global Times that they face the threat of falling rocks and secondary landslides.
Jin said he is mainly responsible for evacuating people living nearby.
“We relocate these people to neighboring villages and hotels to make sure they’re away from the danger zone, and we have to calm the victims’ relatives.”
More than 110 villagers living nearby were evacuated to township schools on Saturday night, due to the possibility of rain and secondary disasters.
“The buried site is also a tourist spot, so there might be tourists buried in the debris,” a Lianghekou villager surnamed Deng told the Global Times.
However, Xu Zhiwen, executive deputy governor of the Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture of Aba, said there’s no need to worry about the tourists, as all 142 who entered the site Friday have been reached, Xinhua reported.
Disaster- prone
The area is known for natural di- sasters and earthquakes.
On May 12, 2008, an earthquake measuring 8.0 on the Richter scale shook Wenchuan, 40 kilometers from Maoxian county, leaving more than 80,000 people dead or missing.
Xu Deshi, a China Earthquake Administration researcher, said he doubts the claim that the landslide was caused by the earthquake. “It’s been nine years since the Wenchuan earthquake. Maybe the earthquake created structural damage to the mountains, but we have to wait until the findings are released,” Xu said.
Villagers told the Global Times that despite frequent natural disasters, they prefer to stay in the region.
“The government relocated residents living in desolate areas of the region where there is no traffic. But those who live in Xinmo village, which is relatively convenient for residents, continue to stay in the area,” a local villager surnamed Zeng said.
Xu Deshi urged the government to provide more disaster detection equipment in the area to provide an early warning system for disasters like this one.
In 2016, the local land and resources bureau listed the village as a potential disaster area, so it planned an evacuation route for the residents, an official surnamed Zhang told news site thepaper. cn.
However, the landslide came from an elevated portion of a mountain, so it exceeds the monitoring range, Zhang said.