Firefighters have called for the evacuation of some 24,000 people from the Brazilian town hit by deadly mud flow from the earlier rupture of the B6 mining dam owned by the Brazilian mining company Vale.

The company's employees were having lunch Friday afternoon when the dam gave away. The confirmed death toll stood at 40 dead by Sunday with up to 300 people estimated to be missing, the Minas Gerais fire department reported.
The death toll from Brazil's collapsed tailings dam climbed to 58, with 305 people still missing in southeast Brazil's Minas Gerais state, said local authorities.

Of the 58 victims, 19 have been identified. The missing people include residents of the destroyed area and workers from Brazilian mining company Vale, according to the state fire department.

Xinhua