UPDATE - Ethiopia: Death toll in dump landslide rises to 65

UPDATES DEATH TOLL, ADDS HISTORY OF DUMP, EDITS THROUGHOUT

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AA)-

The death toll from a garbage dump landslide that buried part of a village under a thick layer of trash has risen to 65, Diriba Kuma, the mayor of the capital Addis Ababa, announced in a statement Monday evening.

As yet no cause for the disaster Sunday has been announced.

Locals said they feared the death toll could rise to as high as 200.

The Addis Ababa Fire and Emergency Case Prevention and Control Authority said Sunday evening that the landslide levelled 15 houses in the area.

At the scene this morning, teams found another badly severed body, put it on a stretcher, and had an ambulance take it away.

"I have lived here for more than 10 years and I know the village well. There are 18 small houses and many squatters all buried under that huge mass of rubble. And the hour it all happened was when most people got back home," a man in his late thirties who requested anonymity told Anadolu Agency.

Another resident said there were at least five people in every house and began to count apprehensively.

-No survivors

Three excavators worked at the site of the disaster early Monday, the huge piles of mixed rubbish giving off a constant stench in the heat.

“Stretcher, stretcher!” a young volunteer called out to a line of policemen from below. One of the policemen said that was not his job.

Shouting furiously, the volunteer eventually got a stretcher and used it to bring up a severed body.
All around, people in black wailed continuously.

At one point, the body of an entire cow was hauled out of the trash.

So far no survivors have been rescued, and the clock is ticking down on hopes of finding any.

The huge pile of rubble that descended on the village also blocked a nearby brook and a street.

"No one saw the danger coming," the first resident said.

-50 years of garbage

The site of the garbage dump has seen 50 years of garbage from Addis Ababa homes and businesses piling up. According to official records, Addis Ababa currently generates 2,400 tons of dry waste every day.

The site was meant for an energy generation scheme which has yet to materialize. For this purpose, it was closed since September 2006, but had reopened in recent months.