The Honduran Fire Department informed that four people died, half of them women, and five were injured following a landslide at an artisanal gold mine in the town of El Retiro, 180 kilometres north of Tegucigalpa.
According to Reuters, the Fire Department said that the miners were covered in sand and stones while they were cleaning up the ore they had extracted from the mine to separate it from the gold.
The news agency reports that accidents like this are a common occurrence in the Olancho department, where farmers turn to illegal mining activities to survive in one of the top 30 poorest countries in the world. The region is also one of the most violent in the country.