Wall of Mud Crushes Philippine Village

As many as 1,800 people remained missing today after a sea of mud crushed a remote mountain village on the Philippine island of Leyte, authorities said.

The mud was as deep as 30 feet in some areas, completely covering houses and an elementary school in the village of Guinsaugon. Rescuers who dug with their hands in the soft mud Friday saved about 80 people, many with broken limbs.

“There are no signs of life, no rooftops, no nothing,” Southern Leyte province Gov. Rosette Lerias said after visiting the scene.

A teacher who was with his pupils at the school when the mud buried it called his sister by cellphone to report that as many as 70 children were alive, radio station DZMM reported. About 250 students and teachers were believed to have been in the school when the wall of mud hit Friday morning.

A national disaster official, Anthony Golez, said the teacher, identified as Rodel Letilla, sent a text message at 4 a.m. today saying four people were alive in the school. After that, his cellphone was dead. “At least it gives us hope that as of 4 a.m. there were living survivors in that building,” Golez said.

Authorities said efforts to reach the school were hampered by mud that in some areas was like quicksand. About 60 soldiers with picks and shovels reached the school site on foot today.

Sen. Richard Gordon, chairman of the Philippine National Red Cross, said 19 bodies had been recovered from the village.

“The entire barrio had a population of 3,000, with 1,800 of them living in the worst-hit area and now considered missing,” Gordon said.

About 35 survivors were being treated for injuries, he said.

Officials said today that 11 villages near Guinsaugon had been evacuated as a precaution.

The mudslide followed nearly two weeks of heavy rains in the central Philippine region about 420 miles southeast of Manila.

The area is known for its geological instability, and authorities warned villagers to evacuate. When the rains appeared to be easing, however, many residents returned, Lerias said.

Some villagers and environmentalists blamed the slide on illegal logging carried out from the 1970s to the mid-1990s. But authorities said vegetation had returned to the area and that trees slid down along with the mud.

Aerial footage showed a wasteland of mud and, in one spot, a pile of twisted corrugated metal roofs.

“Our village is gone, everything was buried in mud,” said Eugene Pilo, whose family was missing. “All the people are gone.”

Villagers reported hearing a loud crack just before the sea of mud descended on the village.

“It sounded like the mountain exploded, and the whole thing crumbled,” said Dario Libatan, who lost his wife and three children. “I could not see any house standing anymore.”

People pulled from the mud Friday were ferried across a stream on a bulldozer and taken by ambulance to a clinic.

The mud was so soft that heavy equipment could not be used and rescuers sometimes sank into the muck up to their waists. Search efforts were halted at dusk Friday because there was no electricity.

“We will try to resume search-and-rescue efforts this morning, but I am not very optimistic because it rained heavily all night, bringing down more mud,” Lerias said early today.

President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo went on national television soon after the slide to promise the full resources of the Philippine government. “Help is on the way,” the president said. “It will come by land, sea and air.”

The U.S. military, which is conducting exercises in the southern Philippines, dispatched the aircraft carrier Essex and the landing ship Harpers Ferry to provide assistance. Ground forces also were available to help, the Pentagon said.

“We will continue to coordinate our response efforts with the government of the Philippines and look for ways to best support them in this hour of need,” White House spokesman Trent Duffy told reporters traveling to Florida on Air Force One with President Bush.

In November 1991, about 6,000 people died on Leyte in floods and landslides triggered by a tropical storm. In December 2003, 133 people died there in floods and mudslides.

Last weekend, seven road construction workers died in a landslide when they fell into a 150-foot deep ravine in the mountain town of Sogod on Leyte.

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Times staff writer Paddock reported from Singapore and special correspondent Vanzi from Manila. Times wire services were used in compiling this report.