Homes and businesses were destroyed and trees fell on city streets. (Representative)
Las Tejerais, Venezuela:
A landslide in central Venezuela killed at least 22 people and left more than 50 missing after a river overflowed, officials said on Sunday, in the latest deadly disaster caused by heavy rains in the country.
Dozens of people have died in recent months in the troubled South American nation as a result of historically high rainfall.
“We are seeing very significant damage here, human loss: so far, we have already found 22 dead, more than 52 people are missing,” Vice President Delcy Rodriguez told local media at the scene in the city of Las Tejerias. “We are working to find these people.”
Homes and businesses were destroyed and trees fell on city streets, which were covered with mud and debris, including scattered wood, household items and damaged cars.
“The village is lost. Las Tejerias is lost,” 55-year-old Carmen Melendez, who has lived her entire life in the city 50 kilometers (30 miles) from Aragua state capital, Caracas, told AFP.
About a thousand people had joined the rescue efforts, Interior and Justice Minister Remigio Ceballos told AFP, as he also worked at the site.
Local residents dug up the remains of battered homes in search of loved ones, while search teams arrived with dogs hoping to find people trapped under the rubble.
– record rain –
“We have a big landmass as a result of the changing climate,” Ceballos said, referring to the effects of Hurricane Julia, which passed north of Venezuela the night before.
“There was record rain,” he said while surveying the disaster site. The amount of rain in a day is usually seen in a month.
“These heavy rains saturated the ground,” he said.
Images taken by rescuers’ drones showed huge piles of mud on the streets as residents tried to flush out the meters of mud flowing into their homes.
President Nicolas Maduro declared three days of national mourning for the victims, while Venezuelans took to social media to offer aid to the city.
Caracas baseball team Los Leones said they would organize a collection for the victims, asking for “non-perishable foods, water and clothing”.
The landslide, triggered by the biggest river flood in the region in 30 years, is the worst this year so far in Venezuela, which has seen historic rain levels in recent months.
In August, at least 15 people died in the Venezuelan Andes after heavy rains caused mud and rocks to slide off.
And in September, at least eight people died when intense rain flooded through a religious retreat in the western part of the country.
In 1999, a massive landslide in the state of Vargas, north of Caracas, killed nearly 10,000 people.
(Except for the title, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)