Quake rescuers seek tiny signs of life
Updated: 2008-05-21 00:49
Monday also marked a week since the quake, a good time, the rescue volunteers said, for finding someone. "It's our greatest hope to find someone. We would be so happy," said a member of the Guizhou Fire Battalion team who would give only his surname, Zhao. "Even if we have 1 percent of hope, it's enough for us."
 Rescue workers look for survivors in the earthquake-hit township of Hanwang, in Mianzhu city north of Chengdu, Sichuan province, May 17, 2008. [Agencies] |
The Guizhou team was trying to reach the person whose ear was first found. As the cool morning turned into a blazing hot afternoon, team members in bright orange jumpsuits, white helmets and facemasks were joined by soldiers in military fatigues. The maneuvered heavy machinery to pry apart stubborn pieces of debris. A crane lifted huge slabs of concrete.
"Slowly! Slowly!" rescuers shouted, worried that the hole they were making in the pile would suddenly collapse.
Equipment used to measure vital signs were lowered in. There were very faint signs of life. The growing crowd watching the process -- mostly journalists and soldiers taking pictures on their cell phones -- craned their necks. An ambulance equipped with a resuscitator and oxygen stood by.
The work stopped only twice: during a brief but strong aftershock around 4 pm, and at 2:28 pm, when emergency vehicles, police cars and work vehicles honked their horns and sirens crescendo in unison to mark the one week of the start of the quake.
There were many false alarms as excitement grew when it seemed like the rescue was almost complete -- then dimmed when it became obvious the person was still trapped. It was never clear what building they were in before it collapsed or whether it was a man or a woman.
By late afternoon, the group of onlookers had thinned and rescuers had taken a new tack.
"Right now, we think the person is about 4 meters (13 feet) deep. We've gone 2 meters (6.5 feet) in and there's a piece of concrete that's blocking us," said an official from the Ministry of Public Security's Fire Battalion told reporters.
"The space can fit only 1.5 people but we have two people squeezed in there, chipping away at the concrete. We do not dare use anything bigger," said the official, who refused to give his name but said he spoke on behalf of the agency.
It was much the same for the trapped woman with the electronic game. Once detected, rescuers surveyed the site. An argument over how to proceed ensued: should they tear through the ground-level rubble or drill from above?
Eventually, they drilled in from the floor above -- and found no one. The mood deflated and the rescue experts dwindled away,
"Sometimes people use their last ounce of strength to call out to us and when they hear that we are coming to save them. They are so emotional, they die," said Wang Jianwei, a member of Zhang's National Rescue Team and who found the 61-year-old woman earlier in the day.
Only a handful of soldiers and two volunteers remained at the site, unconvinced that the space was empty. They resumed calling out to the woman and banging on metal.
"All of us heard the music and some of us heard her voice. There's definitely someone in there," said Meng Ye, a 40-year-old volunteer from the central city of Xi'an. "That sound will haunt me all night."
The men worked after the sunset, using only a small flashlight to keep the darkness away.
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