Hopes were fading Saturday that rescuers would find more survivors from at least 300 missing after a dam collapse at a mine in southeast Brazil, with nine bodies so far recovered.

Polices and firefighters work at the damaged site after the collapse of a dam in Brumadinho Municipality in the southeastern state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. (Photo: Xinhua)

Seven bodies were recovered Friday hours after the disaster, after a torrent of mud broke through the dam at the iron-ore mine close to the city of Belo Horizonte, in the state of Minas Gerias, around 1:00 pm.

By early Saturday the official death toll had risen to nine, local firefighters said, who also doubled the number of people presumed missing from the previous toll to nearly 300 people.

Romeu Zema, the governor of Minas Gerais, told reporters that while all was being done to find survivors, "from now, the odds are minimal and it is most likely we will recover only bodies".

Brazil's new president Jair Bolsonaro, who rushed home from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, is scheduled to fly over the disaster zone Saturday along with his defense minister.

The mine is owned by Brazilian mining giant Vale. It was involved in a 2015 mine collapse in the same state that claimed 19 lives and is regarded as the country's worst-ever environmental disaster.

Vale shares plummeted on the new accident, losing eight percent in New York trading.

Minas Gerais officials obtained a court order blocking Vale's bank account in the state to the tune of $270 million, money that would used for victim relief, according to the G1 news website.