Rescuers racing to find dozens still missing

Rescue workers are racing to find dozens of people still missing after a landslide at a landfill in the central Philippines earlier this week, an official said.

Signs of life were detected in the area in Cebu City two days after the incident, Mayor Nestor Archival said on Saturday.

Archival said four people have been confirmed dead so far, while 12 people have been hospitalized.

The mayor added that conditions for emergency services working in the area were challenging, with dangers such as unstable debris and crews waiting for better equipment to arrive.

The privately owned Binaliw landfill collapsed on Thursday while 110 workers were at the site, officials said.

In a post on Facebook on Saturday morning local time, Archival said: “Authorities have confirmed that signs of life have been detected in certain areas, requiring continued careful excavation and the deployment of a more advanced 50-tonne crane.”

Conditions for rescue teams in the area are difficult as the wreckage is still unstable.

Relatives of the missing are eagerly awaiting news of their whereabouts. More than 30 people, all working at the landfill, are thought to be missing.

“We’re just hoping we can save someone alive… We’re racing against time, so our deployment is 24/7,” Cebu City councilor Dave Tumulak, chairman of the city’s disaster council, told AFP news agency.

Jerahmey Espinoza, whose wife is missing, told Reuters news agency on Saturday: “They have neither seen nor located her since the disaster occurred. We are hopeful that she is still alive.”

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

Garganera told local newspaper The Freeman on Friday that operators cut down the mountain, dug up the soil and then piled up garbage to create another mountain of waste.

Binaliw landfill area is approximately 15 hectares (37 acres).

Landfills are common in major Philippine cities such as Cebu, the commercial hub and transportation gateway of the Visayas, the central islands of the archipelago country.