Soldiers and villagers in eastern Uganda hacked at mounds of thick mud with picks and hoes today in a bid to find more survivors from a landslide that killed at least 80 people.
Waves of mud and rocks swept down the steep mountainside late on Monday night after seven hours of rain and engulfed the village of Nametsi, burying houses, people and livestock.
Some carried away corpses on makeshift stretchers and others stood and gazed at the swathe of mud hundreds of metres wide that ploughed through the village and surrounding banana fields.
The hamlets cling to isolated mountainsides with no proper road access, making rescue efforts difficult. It is a two-hour trek from the main road to reach Nametsi, making it very difficult to get earth moving equipment there.
Tarsis Kabwegyere, Minister for Disaster Preparedness and Refugees, told Reuters last night that 80 bodies had been recovered, but hundreds more people were missing. The government said three villages with more than 3,000 residents were badly hit and mudslides were feared in five other districts experiencing deluges.
Parts of Uganda and neighbouring Kenya have had sustained rainfall over much of the past two months, which is usually a dry period between rainy seasons, and floods are already plaguing large areas.
Local politician David Wakikoona told Reuters that villagers had said some 100 to 150 people were at a trading centre in one hamlet when huge rocks slid down the hillside. He said only eight people were known to have survived so far and the final death toll would probably be over 100.
Reuters