Rescue continues after deadly avalanche
Pastor Dale Morgan
Rescue continues after deadly avalanche*
From correspondents in Dushanbe
December 22, 2007 09:34pm
Article from: Agence France-Presse
AT least 16 people died in an avalanche that swept across a road linking
Tajikistan's capital Dushanbe with the north of the Central Asian state.
"Rescue work is continuing and we don't know how many vehicles and
people could still be under the many metres thick avalanche," an
interior ministry spokesman said.
"The dead are drivers of heavy cargo vehicles and their passengers, who
ignored warnings from the traffic police about the danger of avalanches
and risked their lives trying to cross a dangerous sector," he said.
It is understood that an initial avalanche trapped the trucks, which
were carrying agricultural products, then a second avalanche buried the
vehicles.
Tajikistan is an impoverished ex-Soviet republic that borders
Afghanistan and has mountains across more than 90 per cent of its
territory.