By IANS,
Medellin (Colombia) : The toll in Saturday’s landslide in this northwestern Colombian city reached 25 Tuesday after rescuers recovered more bodies from the rubble, EFE news agency reported quoting authorities.
Municipal officials in Medellin said they found six more bodies Monday with the help of sniffer dogs provided by the city police, which deployed about 300 officers at the site of the tragedy.
Three children were still missing since Saturday’s landslides, which followed days of torrential rain in a poor neighbourhood of the country’s second largest city, the officials said.
At least 16 residents were injured in the incident.
“Because of the information of the community, the relatives, as well as the help of the dogs and all the rescue groups, we have two spots where we can work” to find the missing, head of Medellin’s disaster management office Camilo Zapata said.
A total of 18 houses were swept away and many more were damaged by the landslide in Medellin’s El Socorro neighbourhood.
President Alvaro Uribe, who hails from Medellin, expressed his support to the victims’ families and offered his government’s assistance in dealing with the emergency.
The rains that have drenched Colombia since May 15 have left at least 16 other people dead, 43 injured and rendered more than 124,000 homeless across the country.