Survivor hopes fade in Cairo

2008-09-07 18:06

Cairo - Hopes of finding survivors trapped under giant boulders began to fade on Sunday, a day after a massive rockslide flattened homes in a north Cairo shantytown, burying whole families under the rubble.

"There is little hope of finding anyone alive," an officer at the scene told AFP. "The heat and dust are unbearable, the people standing here can hardly take it, let alone those trapped inside."

He said residents had been ordered to evacuate the area in order to tear down some of the homes to make way for cranes and heavy lifting machinery which had been unable to access the scene of Saturday's accident.

People hurriedly packed belongings and streamed toward nearby shelters provided by the government until further notice, an AFP correspondent said.

According to a security official giving an updated toll, at least 33 people were killed and 47 injured in Saturday's accident after huge boulders crushed 35 homes.

Rescuers worked through Saturday night in a desperate race to find survivors of the tragedy, with estimates from television stations putting the number of people still missing as high as 500.

The section of hill that broke away was estimated at 60m wide and 15m long.

- AFP