Rescuers race to find dozens still missing

Rescuers are working to find dozens of people still missing following a landslide at a landfill in the central Philippines earlier this week, an official said.

Mayor Nestor Archival said on Saturday that signs of life were detected at the site in Cebu City, two days after the incident.

So far, four people have been confirmed dead, Archival said, while 12 others have been taken to hospital.

Working conditions for emergency services at the site are difficult, the mayor added, with dangers such as unstable debris and crews waiting for better equipment to arrive.

The Binaliw private landfill collapsed Thursday while 110 workers were on site, officials said.

In a Facebook post Saturday morning local time, Archival said: “Authorities have confirmed the presence of signs of life detected in specific areas, requiring continued careful searches and the deployment of a more advanced 50-ton crane.”

The working conditions of the rescuers on site are difficult, the wreckage still being unstable.

Relatives of those missing are anxiously awaiting news of their fate. More than 30 people, all working at the landfill, are believed to be missing.

“We just hope we can save someone… We are racing against time, that’s why our deployment is 24/7,” Cebu City Councilor Dave Tumulak, chairman of the city’s disaster council, told AFP.

Jerahmey Espinoza, whose husband is missing, told the Reuters news agency at the scene on Saturday: “They haven’t seen or located him since the disaster. We still hope he is alive.”

The cause of the collapse is not yet clear, but Cebu City Councilor Joel Garganera previously said it was likely a result of poor waste management practices.

Operators had dug into the mountain, extracted the soil, then piled the waste to form another mountain of waste, Garganera told local newspaper The Freeman on Friday.

The Binaliw landfill covers approximately 15 hectares (37 acres).

Landfills are common in major Philippine cities like Cebu, which is the commercial center and transportation gateway to the Visayas, the archipelago’s central islands.