[News]At least ten dead when a rock wall fell off some tourist boats in Brazil

[SougarLord]

Web:https://www.abc.es/internacional/abci-menos-siete-muertos-y-tres-desaparecidos-desprendimiento-rocas-sobre-unas-lanchas-turisticas-brasil-202201091044_noticia.html

 

 

At least ten people who were traveling in a boat died on Saturday in Brazil after the collapse of a cliff in a lake in the interior of the state of Minas Gerais (southeast), the police confirmed this Sunday.

 

So far the death of "a total of 10 people" has been confirmed, Marcos de Souza Pimenta, one of the organizations investigating the case together with the Firefighters and the regional commissioner of the Civil Police in the town of Passos, told reporters. The marine.

 

The two people who remained missing since the accident were found this Sunday by rescuers, who continued to work in the area.

 

On Saturday noon, a large rock fragment detached itself from a ravine and fell, perpendicular, on top of four boats that were strolling through the lake, a tourist region of Minas Gerais.

 

In dramatic videos shared on social networks you can see the exact moment when the massif detaches itself and falls on the boats, to the panic of those who witness the scene from the other boats.

 

 

One of those records shows the minute before the collapse, in which several people warned that "many stones are falling" and yelled at the occupants of the other boats to move away from the wall.

 

 

The deceased were part of the same group of family and friends who were traveling in the boat that suffered the greatest impact during the rockfall, according to firefighters. During the searches "bodies and body fragments turned up," explained Pimenta.

 

The victims were of Brazilian nationality and were between 14 and 68 years old, according to preliminary investigations.

 

More than 30 people were injured, nine of whom required hospitalization.

 

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro shared some videos of the tragedy on Saturday, which he described as a "regrettable disaster."

 

The causes of the collapse will still be determined, but the intense rains that have fallen in recent days in southeastern Brazil favored the landslide, firefighters and specialists point out.

A great tourist attraction

 

The Capitolio region, 300 kilometers from the capital Belo Horizonte, attracts many Brazilian tourists with its rock walls and waterfalls that surround the green waters of Lake Furnas, formed by the hydroelectric dam with the same name.

 

"The peculiar nature of that place, all the tourist attraction that the landscape provides, with the reservoir that forms the lake, the waterfalls and waterfalls, is created by the erosion of the relief, a natural and constant process," he explained to Frace Press (Afp) the geographer Eduardo Bulhoes, from the Fluminense Federal University (UFF).

 

Added to this natural erosion are intense rains, which make landslides like the one that occurred on Saturday, called "mass movements", more likely.

 

"December and January are the months with the most rain in Capitolio and consequently the months with the greatest potential for mass movements," said Bulhoes.

 

To avoid further accidents, it would be advisable to "limit the recreational area and keep walks away from the walls and waterfalls" in the season of greatest risk, concluded the specialist.