Hopes of finding landslide survivors fade
Print Edition
Hopes faded of finding any remaining survivors of a massive landslide in Guatemala that killed at least 86 people, even as families scoured through rubble to find the bodies of loved-ones, with hundreds of others still missing.
Distraught relatives of the victims shoveled alongside diggers through the mounds of earth that destroyed homes in Santa Catarina Pinula on the southeastern flank of Guatemala City after Thursday night’s collapse of a hillside.
Every batch of earth turned up by the diggers held more personal belongings, from mattresses and books to toys and Christmas decorations, reminders of around 350 people who authorities said were still unaccounted for.
Clutching photos of loved-ones, family members stood in line outside a makeshift morgue near the excavation site, some of them crying, to see if they recognized any corpses.
“This is the worst thing that has happened to us,” said Ana Maria Escobar, a 48-year-old housewife, sobbing as she waited for news of 21 missing family members who lived in the town she had left a year ago.
“So far only my sister-in-law has been found,” she added.
One digger unearthed the body of a little girl with scratch marks on her arms and legs, which rescue workers said may have been signs of her struggles to escape. People looking on cried out to prevent the digger from destroying her body.
Gaby Ramirez, an 18-year-old courier, had been searching for her brother with shovel in hand, after the landslide buried a neighbor’s house he was visiting.
“I don’t hope to find him alive, but I do hope to find his body and bury him,” she said. “I have to bury him, I can’t leave him there.”
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