Landslide Focus Shifts To Evacuee Aid

Rescue teams abandoned the search for survivors of a landslide that buried a farming village a week ago and will focus their efforts on helping evacuees who lost their homes in the disaster, an official said Friday.

"We have collectively decided to stop the search-and-rescue phase of the operation," said Gov. Rosette Lerias of Southern Leyte province. "We have decided to move on to recovery and rehabilitation of survivors because our greater responsibility ... is to rebuild the lives of those who have been devastated by this disaster.".

The total number of bodies retrieved from the farming village of Guinsaugon is 139; of those, 40 have been identified. Another 973 are missing and believed buried beneath tons of mud when a mountain collapsed.

Search teams plan to continue looking for bodies for another one to two weeks before turning the area into a memorial for disaster victims, shoring up the earth into an embankment so that it settles with the remaining bodies inside. An estimated 42.4 million cubic feet of earth, covering more than 741 acres, fell on the village, according to the governor.

Lerias said the decision to call off the search for survivors came after heavy rain on Friday caused the river near Guinsaugon to rise, and forced rescue teams to halt their work once again. Wet conditions have hampered the searchers, including Philippine soldiers, U.S. Marines, and Malaysian and Taiwanese teams, since the early hours after the disaster in the southeastern Philippines.

"Nature was working against us," Lerias said. "It is with a sense of disappointment that they were not able to find survivors but also with a sense of satisfaction that they have done their very best."

She said villagers staying at temporary shelters accepted the decision to call off the search when told about it by officials. There are 3,314 evacuees, and donations for them have begun to pour in, Lerias said.

The Philippine army said earlier Friday that a roof spotted in the mudslide-stricken village was not from a school that was buried with more than 240 students and teachers, dealing another blow to the chances of finding survivors.

"According to our rescuers, it is not the school roof. It is the roofing of a house," Philippine Maj. Gen. Bonifacio Ramos said.

Intermittent rains again disrupted the rescue efforts Friday, forcing rescuers to abandon some of the sites considered too dangerous because of a risk of further landslides.

Three more bodies were retrieved Friday. Also found in the mud were pictures, a wallet with an ID, pillows and blankets. No one has been found alive since the first hours after the disaster.

"This kind of disaster leaves a very small chance of survival, that's a reality," said Puji Pujiono, leader of the U.N. disaster assessment and coordination team at the site. "If there is one or two, it would be a miracle," he said. "Taking care of those still alive is equally or more important than prolonging the (search) operation."

Pujiono urged the government to make a list of needs for the hundreds of evacuees so other countries could coordinate donations, and warned of the threat of disease and overcrowding for those who lost their homes. Many are staying in schools in the nearby town of St. Bernard.

Hundreds of U.S. Marines and other rescue workers have been digging with picks and shovels in the mud covering Guinsaugon. Most rescuers focused on a cluster of crumpled tin roofs and part of a big house in the mud, removing rocks by hand.