Rescue officials say at least 14 people have been reportedly dead in an accident at a quarry in the northern Tanzanian city of Arusha.

Local reporters say due to heavy rain fall, the sides of the quarry, where people were illegally digging for rocks and sand for use in building materials collapsed on scores of them in early hours of Monday.

Local residents say the site was banned in 2006 when seven people died in a similar accident which brought the whole area into sorrow.

It is unclear to officials how many of the illegal workers have been trapped by the mud as rescue efforts was called off on Monday night due to darkness.

“We have now called off the rescue operation, we will hopefully continue tomorrow morning” the city’s commissioner Saidi Mecky Sadicky told reporters Monday night

The incident happened in the Moshono district of Arusha, 9km 6 miles from the city centre which somehow remote from the city centre.

This unfortunate accident comes four days after a building near a Koranic school in the capital Dar es Salaam collapsed killing and injuring scores of people.

Rescue officials said 36 bodies were finally pulled out from the debris in the Dar es Salaam disaster which analyst say was very devastating.

Many analysts say the country is really in sadness and sorrow as less than one week, it has been hit by two devastating disasters.

Issaka Adams / NationalTurk Africa News

[adrotate group=”15″]