The landslide occurred last week on Thursday in a suburb located about 9 miles east of the country’s capital Guatemala City. Rescue workers have spent the week digging up bodies and searching for missing persons.
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An official investigation is under way to determine why houses where built in El Cambray 2 neighbourhood despite warnings of a possible accident. Leading up to the tragedy, municipal authorities had urged the community to relocate several times, most recently in November past year.
“What we know is that people were conscious about the risk they were taking”, Manuel Pocasangre, the communications director for the municipality of Santa Catarina Pinula, told the Los Angeles Times on Wednesday. Relatives of the missing checked in at a makeshift morgue set up next to the buried homes.
A lot of them are presumed dead, buried under tons of soil and rocks that slid off the rain-sodden hill last Thursday.
Deputy hospitals minister Israel Lemus said officials still had not chose to suspend the search in Santa Catarina Pinula, but planned to meet to discuss it on Monday.
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Guatemala’s Congress has approved $2.6m (£1.7m) in funds to help the victims.
