China Landslide Death Toll Continues to Rise

The death toll from a landslide at an illegal mine in northern China that buried a village in industrial sludge has risen to at least 128, Chinese state media reported today.

Authorities fear the number of fatalities from Monday's disaster could be hundreds more, the China Daily said.

The accident happened after torrential rain caused walls to burst at the Tashan mine in Linfen City.

Mud and iron ore waste swamped a village of 1,000 people in Xiangfen county, leaving just a handful of houses still standing.

Authorities have declined say how many people were missing, saying an investigation was continuing. But there have been reports that hundreds may have been buried in the sludge.

"There's almost no hope of their survival ... they have been buried for three days under two meters of slush," Wang Jun, head of the state administration of work safety, said.

The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, and the premier, Wen Jiabao, have ordered "a thorough investigation" into the cause of the accident.

Officers were still visiting various households in the area and interviewing residents for a final tally on the number of people missing.

A preliminary investigation showed the landslide was triggered by heavy rains that brought down a retaining wall at a waste dump operated by an illegal mine, said Wang Dexue, deputy head of the State Administration of Work Safety.

The wall's collapse sent a wave of gray sludge over the town, located just below the waste site, washing out homes, cars, and buildings, including one where more than 100 people from a local mining company were holding a weekly meeting, the Shanghai Morning Post said.

A relative of one of the company's employees told the paper that only three of those at the meeting were believed to have survived.

The landslide occurred just as business at a busy outdoor market was getting under way, the report said.

The disaster underscores two major public safety concerns in China: the failure to enforce protective measures in the country's notoriously deadly mines, and the unsound state of many of its bridges, dams and other aging infrastructure.

There are more than 9,000 mine waste dumps throughout China, and more than half of them operate without work safety permits.

Last year almost 4,000 people died in mine-related accidents.