Several dead and missing after landslide in Ecuador

Forty-six people are missing and seven others died in southern Ecuador, in a landslide caused by heavy rains overnight from Sunday to Monday, according to an official report.

Several dozen houses were buried in the town of Alausi about 300 kilometers south of Quito, in an Andean area hit last week by an earthquake that killed 15 people, including one in neighboring Peru.

The landslide left 46 missing, seven dead and 23 injured, Ecuadorian authorities said on Monday in a new report.

Nearly 500 people in total were affected by the flow, on a neighborhood clinging to the mountain in the northeastern outskirts of the city.

Images broadcast by local media showed dozens of rescuers and civilians bustling around the debris to try to free buried people, in a ballet of ambulances with flashing lights and screaming sirens.

Since January, heavy rains have already left 22 dead and 346 homeless in the country. More than 6,900 homes were damaged and 72 were destroyed, authorities said. Some 987 incidents were caused by bad weather, such as floods and landslides.