The floods and deadly landslide that struck Quito earlier in the week killed at least 27 people and injured 53 others, Ecuador authorities said on Friday, looking for two more people still missing.
“We have 27 dead and 53 injured,” said Guido Nounies, a local security official, during a press conference on La Gasca Avenue in the northwestern part of the capital, which was hit hard on Monday.
“Based on the latest information that has reached us, two people are still missing,” he added.
An earlier official report put the death toll at 25, with 48 injured and six missing.
Search and rescue teams continued their efforts yesterday, Friday, to locate victims in what was left of a volleyball court, which swallowed a giant mud landslide. Most of the lives were lost there.
The stadium was crowded with people, athletes and spectators, when it was hit by tens of thousands of cubic meters of mud, rocks and debris, which descended by force from the slopes of Pitsinca volcano.
Torrential rains on Monday, the heaviest in the last twenty years, pounded the capital of Ecuador for almost 17 hours. There was a record precipitation, almost 75 liters per square meter, while the forecasts spoke of no more than 2.
The rainwater holding tank, with a capacity of 4,500 cubic meters, suffered a rupture after receiving more than four times the usual amount of water.
Homes, cars and the power grid were severely damaged.
Three days of mourning were declared, from Tuesday to the day before yesterday Thursday, by the authorities of the capital of 2.7 million inhabitants.
The death toll from the current heavy rains, which have hit 22 of Ecuador’s 24 provinces since October, has risen to 44 dead and 77 injured, according to the latest figures from the National Emergency Management Agency. the day before yesterday Thursday.
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