Rescue workers yesterday searched a sea of mud in vain for survivors of a massive landslide that killed up to 1,800 people, as officials worried about a repeat of the disaster.
Two US warships and 1,000 Marines were steaming to Leyte island in the eastern Philippines, where 11 villages were evacuated in the same area where the farming village of Guinsaugon was wiped out on Friday when half a mountain came crashing down after two weeks of torrential downpours.
Hopes were fading fast of finding anyone alive in the 40-hectare stretch of mud that was 10m deep in places.
"No one alive has been found today, only the dead," said Joselito Rabi, a provincial social worker.
Efforts focused on a swamped elementary school, with unconfirmed reports that some of the 250 students and teachers sent cellphone text messages to relatives. Sixty soldiers were dispatched to the scene in the morning, but had found nothing but bodies as dark fell.
"As of last [Friday] night, many received text messages from those trapped in the school," Southern Leyte Governor Rosette Lerias said.
"They have reportedly closed all windows and doors to stop mud and water from coming in," Lerias said.
"The operations will continue through the night," she added.
The search was complicated by heavy morning downpours, the threat that the adjacent mountain remained unstable and the possibility that 752 troops, firefighters and volunteers could get sucked down into the soft, shifting mud.
The situation was so dangerous that most would-be volunteers were kept out of the area, and a no-fly zone was established over the site because of fears that helicopters' downwash could set off a fresh landslide.
Weather forecasts said a low-pressure area over the Pacific Ocean about 900km southeast of Leyte was likely to generate rain over the landslide zone later yesterday and today before the weather improved.
Only 57 people have been plucked from the mud -- none yesterday -- out of a population of 1,857.
A Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) official said yesterday that Taiwan will donate US$100,000 to aid the relief effort.
In addition to the cash aid, MOFA Spokesman Michel Lu (
The medical emergency kits can meet the needs of 3,000 people for a one-and-a-half-month period, Lu said, adding that the government will continue offering help to the Philippines in cooperation with non-governmental organizations.
also see stories:
Search teams face morbid task
Geologists had warned on Leyte mudslide danger
'Our village is gone, everything was buried'
‘CORRECT IDENTIFICATION’: Beginning in May, Taiwanese married to Japanese can register their home country as Taiwan in their spouse’s family record, ‘Nikkei Asia’ said The government yesterday thanked Japan for revising rules that would allow Taiwanese nationals married to Japanese citizens to list their home country as “Taiwan” in the official family record database. At present, Taiwanese have to select “China.” Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said the new rule, set to be implemented in May, would now “correctly” identify Taiwanese in Japan and help protect their rights, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. The statement was released after Nikkei Asia reported the new policy earlier yesterday. The name and nationality of a non-Japanese person marrying a Japanese national is added to the
AT RISK: The council reiterated that people should seriously consider the necessity of visiting China, after Beijing passed 22 guidelines to punish ‘die-hard’ separatists The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) has since Jan. 1 last year received 65 petitions regarding Taiwanese who were interrogated or detained in China, MAC Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday. Fifty-two either went missing or had their personal freedoms restricted, with some put in criminal detention, while 13 were interrogated and temporarily detained, he said in a radio interview. On June 21 last year, China announced 22 guidelines to punish “die-hard Taiwanese independence separatists,” allowing Chinese courts to try people in absentia. The guidelines are uncivilized and inhumane, allowing Beijing to seize assets and issue the death penalty, with no regard for potential
‘UNITED FRONT’ FRONTS: Barring contact with Huaqiao and Jinan universities is needed to stop China targeting Taiwanese students, the education minister said Taiwan has blacklisted two Chinese universities from conducting academic exchange programs in the nation after reports that the institutes are arms of Beijing’s United Front Work Department, Minister of Education Cheng Ying-yao (鄭英耀) said in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) published yesterday. China’s Huaqiao University in Xiamen and Quanzhou, as well as Jinan University in Guangzhou, which have 600 and 1,500 Taiwanese on their rolls respectively, are under direct control of the Chinese government’s political warfare branch, Cheng said, citing reports by national security officials. A comprehensive ban on Taiwanese institutions collaborating or
STILL COMMITTED: The US opposes any forced change to the ‘status quo’ in the Strait, but also does not seek conflict, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said US President Donald Trump’s administration released US$5.3 billion in previously frozen foreign aid, including US$870 million in security exemptions for programs in Taiwan, a list of exemptions reviewed by Reuters showed. Trump ordered a 90-day pause on foreign aid shortly after taking office on Jan. 20, halting funding for everything from programs that fight starvation and deadly diseases to providing shelters for millions of displaced people across the globe. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has said that all foreign assistance must align with Trump’s “America First” priorities, issued waivers late last month on military aid to Israel and Egypt, the
RSS