Southwest China landslide kills 18, dozens buried

A landslide in China on Friday killed at least 18 people with more than two dozen others trapped, local authorities said.

A landslide in southwestern China on Friday killed at least 18 people, including seven from one family, with more than two dozen others trapped, state media and local authorities said.

Graphic locating Zhenxiong in China's Yunnan province, where a landslide killed at least 18 people and buried many more Friday, officials and state media said.

A total of 46 people were buried in the disaster in landslide-prone Yunnan province, 18 of whom were killed, the official Xinhua news agency said. The Zhenxiong county government gave the same death toll.

Emergency teams had so far rescued two villagers after the landslide, which buried 16 homes, the provincial government said. It also reported the deaths of the seven family members.

Photos that it posted online showed workers digging in wide swathes of clumpy mud against a backdrop of snow-covered terraced hills.

The mountainous area is prone to landslides -- one in a neighbouring county in October killed 18 children while two earthquakes in Yunnan in September, one of magnitude 5.7, left 81 people dead and hundreds injured.