A massive garbage landslide in the Ugandan capital, Kampala, has claimed the lives of 30 people so far, including two children. The collapse at the landfill in the northern district of Kiteezi on Saturday buried people, homes, and livestock in mountains of waste.
Several dozen people are still missing, and the search and recovery efforts are ongoing.
“Today, the team retrieved six dead bodies by 1730 hours (1430 GMT). This makes a total of 30 bodies so far recovered,” the Uganda Police Force said on X, formerly Twitter.
The victims included a boy aged three and a six-year-old girl, as indicated in the list released by the police.
Earlier, Patrick Onyango, the spokesperson for Kampala metropolitan police, reported a death toll of 26 and stated that 39 people, including 35 residents and four garbage collectors, were still missing.
Excavators have been digging through the massive piles of rubbish as the search for survivors continues desperately in Kiteezi, often amid heavy rainfall.
The Uganda police mentioned that 120 individuals were taking shelter in a nearby school, and 33 homes were suspected of being swallowed by the landslide that occurred after heavy rains.
Several regions in Uganda and other parts of East Africa have recently been hit by intense rains, including Ethiopia, the continent’s second most populous country.
A tragic landslide in a remote mountainous area in southern Ethiopia claimed the lives of approximately 250 people last month.
In February 2010, more than 350 people lost their lives in mudslides in the Mount Elgon region of eastern Uganda.