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23 dead in N. China landslide

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Eight infants aged 1 to 4 are among 23 people confirmed dead in Monday's massive landslide that buried part of a village in north China's Shanxi Province, local authorities said Tuesday.

Rescuers stand at the site of a landslide in Zhongyang County of Lvliang in North China's Shanxi province, November 16, 2009.[Xinhua]

The landslide, covering an area of about 20,000 square meters, swept over six homes at about 10:40 a.m. Monday at the Zhangjiaju Village, in Zhangzishan Township of Zhongyang County.

A spokesman with the county government said the last body was recovered early Tuesday and 12 of the dead were male and 11 female.

The victims were migrant workers at a nearby coal mine and their families. They were from five families from the Qiaojia County, in the southwestern Yunnan Province, the spokesman said.

More than 300 people had helped in the rescue operation.

A family of three who lived nearby were saved shortly after the landslide.

"My wife and I and my daughter, who is not yet 2 months old, were sleeping indoors at that time. All of a sudden, mud flooded in and turned my bed over," said Wang Rongce, 27, a migrant coal miner from northwestern Shaanxi Province, Tuesday.

"We were pulled out of the mud by several migrant workers from my hometown. We were covered in mud, and my daughter wasn't even able to cry until the mud was washed off," he said.

His wife, Xu Xia, 20, was still traumatized and sobbing.

"We're very lucky as we're still alive, although we lost all of our belongings," Wang said.

Geological experts confirmed Tuesday that the accident was a loess avalanche, a term to describe a collapse of the weakly cemented loess soil.

Police and officials from the provincial work safety and land and resources authorities are investigating the incident.

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