Over a week after a disastrous landslide hit a mining site in Maco, Davao de Oro, authorities said that 17 unrecognized dead bodies recovered on ground zero will undergo a temporary burial process on Wednesday.

Leah Añora of the Maco’s management of the dead and the missing cluster said that the action was taken as per the recommendation of the municipal health officer, also citing the foul smell that comes from the corpses.

"As of now, we know that the smell of our cadavers is unpleasant because it has already been seven days since the operations started, so what we are doing, our [authorities], they have the parameters in conducting...identifying the victims,” she said in a media briefing on Tuesday.

Añora, however, clarified that the unidentified bodies will be put in cadaver bags and not embalmed in consideration of their religious orientations.

"We don't know that, because they are still unidentified. So they would not be embalmed, but they would be treated.”

She said the burial process will follow certain protocols and guidelines and is subject to the inspection and approval of the provincial sanitary inspectors.

"[For] each of the unidentified bodies at their burial, we will put markings, so that marking has the case number indicated."

Shift to search and retrieval operations

Moreover, the disaster officials will start implementing search and retrieval operations on Wednesday, which they believe will expedite the rescue efforts in the hard-hit area of Barangay Masara.

On Tuesday, Maco Mayor Arthur Carlos Voltaire Rimando signed Executive Order 15 for the switch on operations from the search rescue and retrieval, or SRR, operations conducted in the past days.

"Still, we are hopeful and positive, that we can still rescue someone,” said Rimando on Tuesday.

He added that a ground movement was felt in the landslide-hit area, causing the SRR efforts to be halted.

The rain-induced landslide hit on February 6 at 7:40 p.m. at the gold mining village in Zone 1, Barangay Masara, Maco, burying some houses and vehicles carrying passengers.

As of Tuesday, at 8 a.m., the dead bodies recovered on ground zero are 71, of which 67 are complete body parts and 4 are only body parts.

The 17 unidentified bodies were placed in funeral homes before being temporarily buried.