19 May 2015

Salgar, Antioquia, Colombia: a landslide killed at least 63 people yesterday

Posted by Dave Petley

Salgar, Antioquia, Colombia

Early yesterday morning, a landslide struck the small town of Salgar in Antioquia, Colombia.  Latest reports (in Spanish) are that at least 63 people were killed.  At least 37 people have been injured and an unknown number are missing.

The event appears to have been a debris flow, triggered by heavy rainfall, that tore through the small town in the floor of the valley.  Although the exact location of this event is not yet clear, the Salgar area is characterised by villages lying in the floor of valleys in quite steep upland areas:

Salgar

Google Earth

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Images from the scene – there is a good gallery on the El Tiempo website – suggest that the flow may have been rapid and catastrophic:-

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