Beijing: Nineteen people, including 18 school children, buried under a huge landslide which engulfed a school in southwest China have been killed, the rescuers said on Friday.
The death toll in Thursday’s landslide has risen to 19 as one more body was retrieved, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
The dead included 18 primary school students who were present in Shangba Primary School in Yunnan Province even though it was closed for National Day holidays.
The other man was a villager, who is still missing, the government said.
The children came to attend a special class despite the ongoing National Day holiday arranged for making up the lost time during the recent earthquake that ravaged the area.
They were preparing for the special classes when the landslide struck.
Six houses near the school were also hit by the landslide. The landslide also blocked a river nearby, forming a barrier lake that is 15 meters wide and seven meters deep, a spokesman said.
Yiliang was struck by multiple earthquakes on September 7, which left 81 people dead and 800 others injured.
The government evacuated more than 800 residents living downstream to safer places and mobilised nearly 2,000 people for rescue work.
Three buildings of the school were also damaged in the earthquakes, forcing over 30 students to have lessons at the nearby Tiantou Primary School.
The victims’ families were given 20,000 yuan (USD 3,160) each as compensation, state media reported. (PTI)
