A second mudslide in the same area early on Sunday covered the only mountain road leading to the stricken village. Around 1,500 people were forced to evacuate in case a third landslide struck.

"Our people are battling against weather and time," said Major Armand Rico.

"We're sending two helicopters to help in evacuating victims to hospitals," he said, adding soldiers from an army battalion had been ordered to help in the rescue efforts.

Disaster officials had ordered residents to leave the shanty towns near the area due to the threat of another landslide and flooding in low-lying areas.

"We're forcing all the people in the village to move to a safer place. That place would be declared a no man's land," Voltaire Rimando, the town mayor told reporters after meeting with disaster officials.

"Our science experts said the area was a geological hazard. We're asking all residents to cooperate to avoid more deaths. Our security forces are on stand by and ready to forcibly evacuate all of them to safer areas."

The village has a population of 7,000 people, mostly mine workers, Rimando added.

Landslides and flash floods are common in the Philippines during the monsoon months between May and October, particularly near mining areas, low-lying and coastal areas.

In February 2006, more than a thousand people died when days of monsoon rain eroded a denuded forested mountain on the central island of Leyte, burying an entire village, including a school where most of the people had sought refuge.

The country's worst disaster also happened on the same island in November 1991 when 5,000 people were swept to sea by flash floods brought by monsoon rains. (Reporting by Manny Mogato; Editing by Caroline Drees)