BREAKING NEWS

Housing sought for survivors of deadly Brazil mudslides

TERESOPOLIS, Brazil — Days after mudslides wiped out whole neighborhoods, many residents continued to live in homes in threatened areas, unwilling to join the thousands crowded into shelters despite the ever-present danger to their lives.
Survivors who lost everything and those clinging to homes on unstable ground face an uncertain future as they try to rebuild lives torn apart by the landslides that struck mountain towns outside Rio de Janeiro and killed at least 626 — a death toll that rises every day as more bodies are pulled from the mud.
Municipal, state and federal officials were responding Sunday, setting up a center to register missing persons; distributing 35,000 free cell phones donated by a telecommunications company; and announcing immediate plans to relocate some 2,500 people housed at a packed gymnasium to 18 smaller, better organized shelters at churches, warehouses and other spaces.