Beijing.- The death toll from the landslide that occurred this Tuesday in China’s northwestern Gansu province has reached five dead and twelve missing, following the rescue of several people who remained trapped, local media reported.
The landslide occurred around 06:56 local time (22:56 GMT on Monday) in the village of Renzang, under the administration of the city of Longnan, leaving 33 people buried.
As of 14:50 local time (06:50 GMT), rescue teams had located 21 of the trapped people, five of whom died after resuscitation attempts failed, according to the state agency Xinhua.
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Efforts continue to try to find the other twelve missing people, according to the latest data released by the local newspaper Beijing News.
A fire department official cited by that media outlet noted that four excavators were working simultaneously to remove soil, although teams switch to manual excavation when they detect signs of buried people.
A rescuer deployed to the scene explained that the landslide occurred in a ravine area, near a slope where water flows, and that the mass of detached earth formed a slope between 70 and 80 meters long.
According to that source, some of the people trapped managed to escape on their own, while the first thirteen rescued mostly had minor injuries.
An affected person who managed to flee after the landslide told the newspaper that the group was heading to a wooded area to work on clearing dead trees and replanting seedlings.
According to their testimony, the workers had been performing those tasks for nearly a week and had not observed any previous anomalies on the hillside.
The media outlet added that no rainfall had been recorded in the area before or after the landslide.
In light of the multiple disasters recorded in various regions of the country, Chinese President Xi Jinping urged this Tuesday to deploy all possible efforts in emergency rescue operations, relief, care for the injured, and relocation of those affected.
