Ecuador’s president, Guillermo Laso, confirmed this Monday that they are just that Seven People who have so far been recorded as having died due to the avalanche that devastated a neighborhood in the small town of Alosi, in the middle of the Ecuadorean Andes, on Sunday night.
With this statement, the president contradicted a number Sixteen deceased Provided by the Secretariat for Risk Management (SGR) in the morning hours.
Lasu, who went to Alosi tonight to direct the search and rescue effort himself, also brought the number of people missing from the landslide to 62.
“Let’s keep hope and faith that we will find some of their relatives alive,” and if not, every effort will be made to recover the bodies and hand them over to their relatives, he said in an impromptu statement near the “Ground Zero” caller, as residents also asked The President accelerated state aid and the arrival of heavy machinery.
But Lasso explained that, according to the recommendations of experts, Heavy machinery is not recommended To remove the rubble, because the ground is still unstable and can generate new problems.
The governor also offered to build a housing complex to relocate families who lost their homes and confirmed that support mechanisms will be activated for affected citizens.
He indicated that the Army Corps of Engineers will support the Ministry of Public Works to rehabilitate the road damaged by the avalanche, as well as the drinking water pipes that were destroyed.
Search and evacuation operations
In parallel, groups of neighbors, fire rescue teams and other state institutions continued to search for and remove rubble, taking care that these did not affect the possibility of finding people alive.
For this reason, rescuers sometimes require absolute silence to try and hear any sign of possible survivors.
Residents of unaffected neighborhoods, which are eventually within range of a new landslide, also began collecting their belongings to evacuate the city.
Temporary shelters have been set up in the safe areas of Alausí, although very few people have gone to this type of accommodation at the moment.
affected the “devil’s nose”
The waiting, which can turn into anguish, has prompted groups of neighbors to improvise remedies and dynamics to defuse the situation.
The avalanche also affected the old railroad line that crosses the area which, among its nearby destinations, is the so-called Devil’s Nose, one of the most emblematic railroad crossings in South America.
This section, which lies on the line connecting a strip of coast and the central Andean highlands of the country, is on the rocky ground of a pointed mountain that can only be solved with a variety of rails to overcome the unevenness.
At this point, the train must reach the top of one of the levels and then zigzag down and then reverse until it joins the section in the direction of the road, although there is a ledge on the side, making it a rail adventure. considered extremist.
