50 Feared Dead in Bolivian Avalanche

Torrential rains at a gold mine worked by thousands of impoverished prospectors in northern Bolivia set off an avalanche of mud and stone Monday that killed an estimated 50 people and destroyed at least 100 homes, authorities said.

The landslide wiped out part of the village of Chima, where about 3,000 miners live with their families in ramshackle homes. By nightfall Monday, about nine hours after the disaster, rescue workers at the scene had recovered 10 bodies, but many more were feared buried.

“The miners were aware the hill was unstable but they still go to work because they have no choice,” said Juan Carlos Camacho, secretary of the Regional Federation of Gold Mining Cooperatives. “The families whose houses were destroyed lost the little they had.”

Jose Plata, an official with the Chima mining cooperative, begged authorities to send helicopters to the area about 125 miles north of La Paz, Bolivia’s capital, “to check the damage so they will see we are not exaggerating.”

Authorities in La Paz were mobilizing rescue personnel to travel to Chima, but it was expected to take them 12 hours to reach the site. Phone service to the village was cut off and people at the scene were communicating with authorities in La Paz via radio.

“We have suffered a tragedy this morning at 10:30, with countless losses,” Plata told Radio Fides. “The number of injured is very high.”

According to officials with the gold miners’ cooperative in La Paz, the conditions at the Chima mines are completely unregulated. Miners come and go as they please at different times of year and earn what they collect. There are no safety controls.

Many of the dead are believed to be men who were working at a relatively new section of the mine, below another part of the hill that was mined half a century ago. The old cut is believed to have filled with water and triggered the slide.

“We can’t be sure how many people were in the line of the slide because they are individuals who work on a casual basis,” said Amadeo Herrera, president of the gold miners’ federation. He estimated that 50 miners had been killed.

Herrera said it will require heavy digging equipment to remove the bodies. It is possible that many will not be recovered, he said.

Although landslides are common in the area during the rainy season, Gov. Mateo Laura said the La Paz provincial government was poorly equipped to deal with a disaster of Monday’s magnitude.

“I appeal to the international community to show solidarity with the victims of this tragedy,” Laura said. His government possesses no helicopters for emergency evacuations, he said.

A team of four Bolivian air force helicopters was being dispatched to the scene from the southern city of Santa Cruz but would not arrive until today, he said.

Camacho of the gold miners’ federation said the landslide was preceded by five hours of rain. A group of men continued mining at the site, despite the increasing danger.

“We run the risk of working to collect a few grams of gold,” he said. Two years ago, Chima suffered a similar avalanche in which eight people were killed.

*

Times staff writer Tobar reported from Buenos Aires and special correspondent Enever from La Paz.