Arrest threat gone, locals risk lives to find Washington mud slide survivors

[World News]

By Jonathan Kaminsky DARRINGTON, Washington (Reuters) - Hours after a Washington state mudslide buried a community, Dayn Brunner took his life in his hands and dashed into the expanse of cement-like muck in search of his sister. Brunner was among dozens of people who had defied threats of arrest to search for loved ones on their own after a 1,500-foot long section of rain-soaked hillside tumbled onto a river near the town of Oso on Saturday, smothering a state road and swallowing up dozens of homes. She was driving on the road when the slide came down," Brunner, 42, said in an interview. ... They've got the know-how, they've got the experience," Dan Rankin, mayor of Darrington, said after a town hall meeting late on Tuesday.

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