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-- OriginalOwner_ [tinyurl.com] writes:

from the consequences-of-unrestrained-industrialization dept.

Russia Today reports [rt.com]

A horrifying video of a landslide swallowing up the city of Shenzhen in southern China shows entire buildings being gobbled up in seconds. Meanwhile, the number of people missing has jumped to 91, China Central Television (CCTV) reports.

The disaster occurred in the Hengtaiyu industrial park in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, on Sunday morning [December 20], destroying a total of 22 buildings and causing a gas pipeline explosion.

[...]An area of about 1 million square meters has been buried in soil.

Al Jazeera reports [aljazeera.com]

The official Xinhua news agency [...] said 14 people had been rescued and more than 900 people had been evacuated from the site by Sunday evening.

Rescue operations were slowed by numerous obstacles, including continued rain, low visibility overnight, and mud, Ao Zhuoqian, a member of the Shenzhen fire brigade involved in on-site rescue, told Xinhua.

[...]The mud [...] was six metres deep in parts, state media said.

More than 2,000 rescuers with sniffer dogs and drones were sifting through rubble looking for survivors after the landslide left everything covered in mud, leaving only a surface of yellow sand visible, Xinhua said.

The accumulation of a large amount of construction waste meant that mud was stacked too steep, "causing instability and collapse, resulting in the collapse of buildings", the ministry of land resources said in a statement, referencing an investigation from provincial authorities.

A nearby section of China's major West-East natural gas pipeline also exploded, state television said, though it was not clear if this had any impact on the landslide.

[...]The frequency of industrial accidents in China has raised questions about safety standards following three decades of breakneck economic growth.

In one of China's worst landslides in living memory, more than 1,500 people died in 2010 when a barrage of mud slid down a mountainside into a town in the northwestern province of Gansu following torrential rain.

The Los Angeles Tines notes [latimes.com]

In 2008, a mudslide in the northern province of Shanxi, triggered by the collapse of a mining waste reservoir, killed 277.

Previous: Large Warehouse Explosions Injure 300-400 in Tianjin, China [soylentnews.org]
Tianjin Explosions Update: Over 100 Dead; Company Abused the Law [soylentnews.org]

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