Dead, missing and injured after boat collapse with tourists in Brazil

At least seven people were killed, 31 injured and 4 missing after a rock wall collapsed in a valley on four boats with dozens of tourists On board the ship in Lake Furnas, in the city of Capitolio, a tourist area in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais located 290 kilometers from its capital, Belo Horizonte, the corps reported. Firefighter.

The collapse of a strip of rock was filmed from other boats and it can be seen how the giant stone smashed the boats and sent several people flying.

And so the tragedy became a national uproar.

Fire chief Edgard Estevo told the media that seven people drowned or were crushed by rocks that fell into the lake.

The victims have not been identified until tonight, and according to the calculations of the Capitolio tour companies, 4 are still missing.

Estevo reported 20 people missing but over time that number has been reduced to four.

Four people were also taken to hospital and 27 others were discharged after recovering from their injuries.

The President of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, reported that the Navy is engaged in tracing one of the most important lakes, both for tourism and for power generation in most parts of the country.

Videos with the landslide scene show that boats near the canyon walls were warned by other boats of a landslide, but the warning did not arrive in time.

In the area there were about 20 boats with tourists, especially since the lake receives visitors on weekends.

Firefighters and Navy divers searched the bodies during the afternoon and stopped work at 6:30 pm as night fell.

On social networking sites, scenes of firefighters rescuing the wounded who were floating from the water, amid the screams of survivors on one of the shores of Lake Furnas, where they were transporting rescuers.

The tragedy occurred at 12:30 p.m., after Nova Lima, in the metropolis of Belo Horizonte, was hit by flooding and the uncontrolled advancing of water after it was overflowed by heavy rain, damming up waste in an iron mine.

Geologists consulted by GloboNews have suggested rockslide is a possibility within a formation like a canyon, but caution that the collapse of a giant stone strip toward the lake may be due to the force of rain that has been hitting Minas Gerais daily since December. Bahia, Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo.

In addition to President Bolsonaro, opposition leader and former president Luis Inacio Lula da Silva offered condolences for the tragedy, as well as the entire political arc, especially since Bahia state reported 26 deaths last week due to flooding and more than 90,000 evacuees in 72 municipalities.

Geologist Fabio Braz, of the Brazilian Geological Society, explained that the separation of part of the canyon rock in Lake Furnas was vertical and vertical.

“Excess water penetrates the cracks of the rocks and increases the weight of the stone block. With this heavy rain the block fell. The fall of the block resembles the shape of a tower. It is necessary to avoid approaching the wall, and in case of rain the tourist activity must be stopped,” he told O Globo newspaper.

A spokesman for the Minas Gerais Fire Department, Pedro Ihara, explained that the way the rock fell from the cannon ended up directly injuring boats and people.