Rescuers search for survivors as quake death toll exceeds 12,000
Broch man flies out to help police, soldiers and mercy workers in China’s Sichuan province
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Rescue workers sifted through debris yesterday for thousands of victims buried or missing in China’s earthquake, as the death toll soared to over 12,000 in the hardest-hit province alone.
As night fell the day after the powerful 7.9-magnitude quake tore through urban areas and mountain villages across central China, rescue workers reached the epicentre in Wenchuan county, north of the Sichuan provincial capital, Chengdu.
Some 50,000 police and soldiers were mobilised. The death toll is expected to jump sharply as rescuers work their way through hard-hit towns at the epicentre.
Initial reports from soldiers who had to hike in over blocked roads showed there may be only 2,300 survivors from a population of 9,000 in the town of Yinxiu.
People in the city of Mianyang, about 60 miles east of the epicentre, spent a second night sleeping outside in the rain, some under plastic sheeting strung between trees. The government ordered people not to return home, citing safety concerns, and posted security guards outside apartment complexes to keep people out.
Few lights were on in the city of 700,000, and people ate by candlelight.
Rescue teams brought people evacuated from the hard-hit town of Beichuan to Mianyang’s sports stadium for food and shelter. Outside the railway station, police shouted through megaphones telling people where they could get free rice porridge.
In a massive government relief operation, some 20,000 soldiers and police arrived in the disaster area with 30,000 more on the way by plane, train, truck and on foot, the defence ministry told the official Xinhua News Agency.
Xinhua said more than 12,000 people had died in Sichuan province alone, but difficulties in accessing some areas meant the total number of casualties remained uncertain. In counties around one city near the epicentre, 18,645 people remained buried, the agency said.
Fifteen missing British tourists were believed to be in the area at the time of the quake and were “out of reach”, Xinhua reported. They were likely visiting the Wolong Nature Reserve, home to more than 100 giant pandas, whose fate also was not known, Xinhua said, adding that 60 pandas at another breeding centre in Chengdu were safe.
The Wolong centre is deep in the hills north of Chengdu along a winding, two-lane road that reports say has been wiped out in places by the quake.
Another group of 12 Americans, also on a panda-watching tour, remained out of contact.
The disaster comes less than three months before the start of the Beijing Olympics. In light of the quake, organisers said the Olympic torch relay will be simplified, and begin with a minute of silence today when it visits the south-eastern city of Ruijin. People along the route will be asked for donations to help disaster victims.
The Chinese government said it would welcome outside aid supplies, but not relief workers. Still, Russia was sending a plane with rescuers, and north-east firefighter John Anderson was last night flying out to China as a rescuer.
Mr Anderson, 56, of Fraserburgh, flew to London yesterday to catch a late-night flight to Hong Kong, and is due to arrive in the disaster zone this morning.
He is one of 10 members of the International Rescue Corps (IRC) who were put on standby yesterday morning to join volunteers from America and Canada. The IRC, which has offices in Grangemouth, has organised mercy missions all over the world.
Mr Anderson, fire station manager at Fraserburgh, has travelled overseas to help survivors of an earthquake in Japan. He has also worked in Turkey, Nicaragua, Mozambique and India in the aftermath of earthquakes, floods and hurricanes.
Speaking from the family home at Dennyduff Road, his wife Margaret said: “He was told to stand by this morning and by lunchtime he was all packed and on his way to catch a flight to Heathrow.
“When he left he didn't know what was going to happen. It was all up in the air until this afternoon.”
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