China: Landslide triggered by heavy rain in Fujian kills 26

A landslide in south-east China's Fujian Province trapped dozens of people on 8 May. On Monday, China's CCTV channel said on Twitter that 26 people are confirmed dead while 13 are still missing.
The landslide was triggered by a heavy downpour that saw 191.6 millimetres of rain in just 24 hours starting on 7 May. A stream of at least 100,000 cubic metres of mud and boulders tore through the construction site of a hydroelectric dam and destroyed an office building.

According to Xinhua, President Xi Jinping had "demanded all-out efforts to search for buried and missing people, and stressed proper treatment for the injured, while consoling the relatives of the injured and missing". The people receiving treatment are stable. Some of the victims suffered bone fracture.

A survivor, Deng Chunwu, said: "We were still asleep when the mountains began to jolt very strongly and before we know it, sand and mud are flowing into our room," the Guardian reported.

He added: "It's been raining all the time over the past couple of days and I didn't think it was a big deal. But the rain last night was fiercer than ever." He reportedly escaped death by hiding under a pole.

Firefighters and police searched for the missing and attempted to clear roads that lead to the site. A county department official by the surname Wei said on phone that the reason for the landslide is still unclear but it could be because of the large amount of rainfall the area has witnessed in recent days.