MANILA: A landslide triggered by heavy rains in a southern Philippine province buried 38 people and two buses, disaster officials said on Wednesday.

The landslide happened on Tuesday night outside a gold mining site in the town of Maco in the province of Davao de Oro where the buses were picking up employees, mining operator Apex Mining said in a statement.

It was not immediately clear how many passengers were on board the buses.

Those injured, including one in critical condition, were taken to a hospital, Maco town’s disaster agency said in a Facebook post on Wednesday.

The disaster agency also issued evacuation orders in five villages in Maco, located on the island of Mindanao.

Evacuation orders issued for five villages in Maco

Of the 38 people, seven were killed and 31 injured. The landslide on Tuesday night struck Masara in Davao de Oro province on Mindanao island, provincial disaster official Edward Macapili told AFP, destroying houses and engulfing three buses and a jeepney waiting for mine workers.

Rescuers were digging through mud to find 48 people reported missing, including at least 20 people trapped inside the vehicles, officials said.

At least 28 people were on board the vehicles when the landslide hit, but eight managed to escape unhurt through the windows before the mud engulfed them, Macapili said.

The buses and jeepney had been outside a gold mine operated by the Philippine company Apex Mining where they drop off and pick up workers.

Initial reports said two buses were hit by the landslide, but Apex Mining said in a statement on Wednesday afternoon that three 60-seater buses and a 36-person-capacity jeepney were impacted.

A fourth bus had left before the mud swamped the area, the firm said, adding that 62 employees were safe while 45 were missing.

Science and Technology Secretary Renato Solidum said a number of huge earthquakes had destabilised the region in recent months.

“Every time there is a major earthquake we have to worry about multiple landslides every time the rains come,” Solidum told a disaster briefing attended by President Ferdinand Marcos.

Rescue teams from across the region have been deployed to help search the large area under mud, Macapili said.

“We have equipment but we are mostly doing it manually because digging with backhoes is dangerous as you don’t know if there are people trapped beneath the debris,” he said.

Seven bodies have been pulled out so far, an official from the Maco municipal disaster agency said.

“There was no sign that a landslide would occur because the rains stopped on Thursday and by Friday it was already sunny and hot,” he added.

Forced evacuations

The official said an earthquake shook the village shortly after the landslide.

The search effort was halted at midnight because it was too hazardous to continue, but resumed at daylight, he said.

In a statement to the Philippine Stock Exchange, Apex Mining said it had reduced operations as it assists the rescue effort with equipment, personnel and food.

Meanwhile, hundreds of families from Masara and four nearby villages have been forced to evacuate from their homes and shelter in emergency centres.

Rain has pounded parts of Mindanao off and on for weeks, forcing tens of thousands into shelters.

At least 18 people died from landslides and flooding in the region last week, the national disaster age­ncy said in its latest update, as the northeast monsoon and a low pressure trough brought downpours.

A powerful magnitude 7.6 earthquake struck off the east coast of Mindanao in December, briefly triggering a tsunami warning, and was followed by a series of major aftershocks.

Earthquakes regularly strike the Philippines, which sits along the Pacific Ring of Fire, an arc of intense seismic and volcanic activity that stretches from Japan through Southeast Asia and across the Pacific basin.

Published in Dawn, February 8th, 2024