By IANS/EFE,
Bogota : A couple and their four children died when a mudslide buried their home in the northwestern province of Antioquia, Colombian authorities said.
The director of a disaster response agency, John Freddy Rendon, told Caracol Radio that the mudslide buried a house in Angostura.
He said that the dead included a man, his wife and their four children, ranging in age from 6 months to 11 years.
The family died before emergency personnel could pull them from the mud, Rendon said, adding that the bodies had all been recovered.
At the end of last month, the Colombian government announced a $30 million contingency plan to attend to emergencies caused by the downpours expected during the September-October rainy season.
The Andean country experienced one of the longest and most damaging rainy seasons in April and May 2010 that left more than 470 people dead and 3.4 million with some kind of property damage.
Colombia has two rainy seasons annually, the first from March/April to the middle of the year and the second in September and October, but over the past 12 months the rains have not let up for long.