Rockslide kills 31 in Cairo district

23 are injured in overcrowded shantytown

Residents searched the rubble after a rockslide in a Cairo shantytown yesterday. At least 31 died and 23 were injured. Residents said the government did not provide enough help. (Nasser Nuri/Reuters)

CAIRO - At least 31 people were killed and 23 injured when a massive rockslide hit a crowded Cairo shantytown yesterday, sending rocks and boulders crashing down on dozens of houses, officials said.

The tumbling rocks buried about 50 buildings in the Manshiyet Nasser shantytown in eastern Cairo near the Moqattam plateau, where houses are huddled along a highway at the foot of cliffs.

State news agency MENA said parts of the area were being evacuated because new cracks had been seen in the cliff face.

Dozens of police and rescue workers were sent to the scene, backed up by fire engines, ambulances and search dogs, but residents were enraged at what they saw as an inadequate government response to the disaster. Neighbors dug by hand to try to find any survivors.

Hundreds of weeping residents gathered around the cordoned-off site, cursing local authorities and saying they had relatives and friends trapped beneath the rubble.

"You've just got your hands in your pockets. You're not doing anything!" one man yelled at police standing nearby.

Hassan Ibrahim Hassan, 80, whose house escaped the destruction, described a scene of horror. "The power went out, we heard a loud bang like an earthquake, and I thought this house had collapsed," he said. "I went out, I saw the whole mountain had collapsed."

Many parts of Cairo are densely crowded, packed with families who came to the city from impoverished rural areas. Some districts hold about 100,000 people per square mile and residents say they have suffered from decades of government neglect.

The shantytown of Manshiyet Nasser, with its red brick houses and unpaved narrow alleys is famously overcrowded, with entire families sometimes squeezed into a single room.

A woman in a white veil screamed "My children, my children! I didn't get anyone out, I need to see them, even if they're dead!"

MENA said the authorities had sent for heavy lifting equipment, but rescue efforts were moving slowly. About 30 riot police were deployed to the area.

Many residents said they had reported a small rockslide to local authorities weeks ago, but accounts differed as to the outcome of the incident.