Hundreds Feared Dead in Mudslides in Philippines

Mudslides triggered by heavy rains buried most of two villages in the central Philippines today, and officials feared that hundreds of people were killed.

Hundreds of homes and a packed elementary school were under the mud.

The Red Cross estimated that 200 people were dead and 1,500 missing. It emphasized that there had been no count. Only four bodies have been recovered.

Didita Kamarenta, who lives near Saint Bernard town in Leyte province, said the ground shook and there was a strong gust of wind.

“I felt mud at my feet. I heard someone outside screaming for help,” she said on a radio broadcast. “All the children, including my two children, are lost.”

“The ground has really been soaked because of the rain,” Rosette Lerias, the governor of Southern Leyte, told radio DZBB. “The trees were sliding down upright with the mud.”