SANAA, 30 December 2005 — At least 36 people were killed when a landslide struck a mountain village west of the Yemeni capital Sanaa late on Wednesday. The death toll was expected to rise as search operations continued yesterday, officials said.
A rocky hill overlooking the village of Dhafir, some 60 km from Sanaa, collapsed and rolled over the village, destroying about 50 houses. Fifteen houses were crushed by giant rocks that slid off the mountain when the hillside collapsed, triggering an avalanche.
Police officers at the scene said 20 bodies were recovered yesterday, adding that 87 people were reported missing.
Col. Fadhle Al-Anshaly, a police officer overseeing the rescue efforts said 16 bodies were recovered from the wreckage of destroyed houses Wednesday.
Authorities deployed hundreds of paramilitary troops to help clear the wreckage of destroyed and buried homes.
Thousands of people from neighboring villages also rushed to the area to join in the rescue work.
Top state officials, including Vice President Abdu-Rabu Mansour Hadi and Prime Minister Abdul-Qader Bajammal, visited the area to oversee the rescue work.
Rescuers complained, however, that the lack of heavy machines had caused a delay in the search and rescue operation. “We have more than 30 ambulances waiting here to rush victims to the hospitals, but we lack the tools to get those people out of the wreckage,” one rescue worker complained.
“Twenty-three bodies were recovered from one house alone. They belonged to the same family,” a witness said.
Only three persons have been rescued from under the rubble, the official news agency, Saba, reported.
It was not immediately clear what caused the landslide. Yemen’s seismology center had no word of an earthquake and there were no reports of bad weather.
