Ecuador landslide death toll rises to 14

Fourteen people died and 67 are still missing after the landslide that buried a district of the city of Alausi, in southern Ecuador, on Sunday, according to a new report announced on Wednesday by the authorities.

A gigantic mountain section broke off overnight from Sunday to Monday and fell on a peripheral district of this city of 45,000 inhabitants in the province of Chimborazo, about 300 km south of Quito.

The landslide also left 33 injured, and 163 houses were affected, according to the latest report provided by the National Risk Management Secretariat (SNGR).

Unlikely to find survivors

On the spot, the rescuers and the relatives of the disappeared continue to dig slowly but relentlessly in the mud, digging up personal objects, clothes and photographs.

But the emergency services warned that the probability of finding survivors was almost nil, three days after the disaster.

The government set up three shelters for people who lost their homes, and ordered the evacuation of some 600 houses near the disaster area.

This sector had been on “yellow alert” since February due to rainfall.

Hit by heavy rains that caused widespread flooding, Ecuador last week declared a state of emergency in 13 of the country's 24 provinces, to mobilize resources to help those affected.

Before the mudslide, Ecuador was already deploring 22 dead and more than 6,900 homes affected by the weather.