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BRUMADINHO, Brazil – Brazilian firefighters and Israeli rescue workers dug sticks into treacherous mud on Monday in search of bodies as the mining company responsible for the exploding dam was swamped by a flood of iron ore waste.
Towards the end of the day, the death toll reached 65, with 279 people still missing, said Lieutenant-Colonel Flavio Godinho of the Department of Civil Defense of Minnes Gerais, in the south-east of the country.
As a sign of the risks badociated with deep mud, Colonel Alexandre Ferreira, a doctor from the military police in Minas Gerais, advised rescue teams, volunteers and journalists to take antibiotics to prevent cholera, bacterial infection, leptospirosis and other diseases.
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According to officials, the death toll is expected to increase "exponentially", with none of them having been saved alive since Saturday.
The search was extremely slow because of the sea of treachery of reddish-brown mud that arose when the tailings dam broke through on Friday afternoon. The mud reached up to 8 meters deep in some places, forcing the researchers to cautiously walk on the edges of the mud or slowly crawling on it so that they would not sink and drown not.
Rescuers are struggling on a site where a body was found inside a vehicle stuck in the mud a few days after the fall of a dam in Brumadinho, Brazil, Monday, January 28, 2019. (AP / Leo Correa)
The teams focused their research on Monday morning in areas where a bus was submerged and where many workers were having lunch in the cafeteria of the mine when the dam burst.
The owner of the mine, Vale SA, is the world's largest producer of iron ore, a raw material for steelmaking. US stocks of the Brazilian company fell by 18% Monday on the New York Stock Exchange.
At the scene of the disaster, helicopters searching for bodies took off and landed non-stop. On the ground, dozens of rescuers accompanied by locating dogs searched for bodies in the muddy mountains. An Associated Press photographer has witnessed at least 10 helicopters each carrying a body.
A firefighter helicopter carries the body of a victim of Friday's dam collapse into an iron mine owned by the Brazilian mining company Vale, near the town of Brumadinho, in the state's Minas Gerais, southeast of Brazil, January 28, 2019. (Mauro PIMENTEL / AFP)
More than 100 Israelis equipped with a specialized rescue technology have joined the 200 Brazilian firefighters in search.
The Israeli delegation is mainly composed of military search and rescue experts and doctors, as well as members of the Israeli Navy's diving unit Yaltam, the army planning a large number of submarine missions in the flooded region. .
The military said search and rescue teams would use radar, underwater sonar, cellular detection systems and drones to locate missing persons.
An Israeli relief specialist, right, arrives at a site where a body was found inside a vehicle stuck in the mud, a few days after the collapse of a dam in Brumadinho, Brazil, Monday, January 28, 2019. (AP / Leo Correa)
Areas of mud soaked with water appeared to be drying out, which could help firefighters to reach previously inaccessible areas. Nevertheless, the research teams did not have much time, the residents were comfortable and some started looking for their loved ones alone.
A Catholic priest for a church now used as a command center for rescuers said many of his parishioners would be buried in the mud.
"It will be difficult to rebuild our hearts," said priest René Lopez. "It will not take a month or a year. It's an open wound for all Brumadinho residents. "
And anger grew against Vale in the midst of questions about the region's biggest employer after the apparent absence of siren alert before Friday's collapse.
A mud-covered protester occurs at a protest outside the headquarters of the Brazilian mining company Vale in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on January 28, 2019. (Fabio TEIXEIRA / CDS / AFP)
"The society has not cared for the people," said Josefa de Santos, who has friends and neighbors among the missing. "I heard the screams of people asking for help, everyone was running and shouting. The siren did not ring at all, it was horrible. "
In an email, Vale told The Associated Press that the area had eight sirens, but that "the speed with which the event occurred has made the alarm impossible." When the dam burst.
Senator Renan Calheiros called for the resignation of Vale's board of directors and Attorney General Raquel Dodge told reporters that Vale's executives could be held accountable.
Vice President Hamilton Mourão said that a crisis committee created by President Brumadinho "is studying" the possibility of revoking the Vale Board of Directors. His office then told AP that the government would not intervene because Vale is a private company.
Over the weekend, the courts froze about $ 3 billion worth of Vale's badets intended for the state's emergency services and asked the company to indicate how it would help the victims.
A couple with missing relatives takes a look at the flooded area after the fall of a dam in Brumadinho, Brazil on Saturday, January 26, 2019. (AP / Andre Penner)
The mine waste carpet has also raised fears of widespread environmental contamination and degradation.
According to Vale's website, waste is mainly sand-based and non-toxic. But a UN report revealed that waste from a similar disaster in Brazil in 2015 "contained high concentrations of toxic heavy metals."
The dam, owned by Vale and the Australian mining company BHP Billiton, collapsed in the city of Mariana in Minas Gerais, leaving 19 dead and hundreds forced to leave their homes.
About 250,000 people were without drinking water and thousands of fish died. About 60 million cubic meters (646 million square feet) of waste flooded the surrounding rivers and eventually spilled into the Atlantic Ocean.
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