Firefighters suspect that heavy rainfall in the region in recent days put pressure on the canyon walls.
Rescue teams on Sunday resumed their search for the three missing after the fall of a rocky wall of a canyon on some boats in a lake in Brazil that has caused at least seven deaths and thirty injured.
Members of the Fire Department, the Navy and the Police participate in the operation mounted at the scene of the accident, which occurred around noon on Saturday in the tourist municipality of Capitólio, in the state of Minas Gerais (southeast).
A video that circulates on social networks and whose authenticity was confirmed to Efe by firefighters shows the moment when the huge rock detaches itself from the canyon wall and falls on four boats that were in Lake Furnas.
In another video moments before the disaster, the affected boats are seen trying to get away from the canyon wall, amid the warnings and shouts of the people who were in the surrounding boats.
At first the firefighters reported that there were 20 missing, although hours later they reduced that number to three after contacting a good part of them.
The vast majority of those injured had minor injuries, but four remain hospitalized, according to authorities.
Firefighters suspect that heavy rainfall in recent days in the region put pressure on the canyon walls, which may have caused the landslide.
The spokesman for the Minas Gerais Fire Department, Pedro Aihara, explained yesterday, in statements to the ‘GloboNews’ channel, that this region of canyons is made up of sedimentary rocks “more susceptible to the actions of wind and rain” and, therefore, they “have less resistance” to inclement weather.
The place where the accident occurred is a very touristy point in Capitólio, a city located about 280 kilometers from Belo Horizonte, the capital of Minas Gerais (southeast), and famous for its natural beauties and its impressive gorges, which can be visited at through boat trips.
Elsewhere in Minas Gerais, heavy rains also caused the overflow of a dam at the French steelmaker Vallourec on Saturday, forcing the highway that connects Belo Horizonte with Rio de Janeiro to be cut off, with no fatalities. (I)
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