Frantic search for survivors
Dozens of children buried in rubble after 7.1 Mexico earthquake
MEXICO CITY: Desperate rescue workers scrabbled through rubble in a floodlit search early yesterday (local time) for dozens of children feared buried under a Mexico City school, one of hundreds of buildings wrecked by the country’s most lethal earthquake in a generation.
The magnitude 7.1 shock killed at least 217 people, nearly half of them in the capital, 32 years to the day after a devastating 1985 quake and less than two weeks after a powerful tremor killed nearly 100 people in the south of the country.
Among the twisted concrete and steel ruin of the Enrique Rebsamen School, soldiers and firefighters found at least 22 dead children and two adults, while another 30 children and 12 adults were missing, President Enrique Pena Nieto said.
There were chaotic scenes at the school as bulldozers moved rubble under the buzz and glare of floodlights powered by generators, and parents at the school clung to hope their children had survived.
‘‘They keep pulling kids out, but we know nothing of my daughter,’’ said 32yearold Adriana D’Fargo, her eyes red after hours waiting for news of her 7yearold.
Three survivors were found at around midnight as volunteer rescue teams formed after the 1985 quake and known as ‘‘moles’’ crawled deep under the rubble.
TV network Televisa reported that 15 more bodies, mostly children, had been recovered, while 11 children were rescued.
The earthquake toppled dozens of buildings, broke gas mains and sparked fires across the city and other towns in central Mexico. Falling rubble and billboards crushed cars.
Parts of colonialera churches crumbled in the state of Puebla, where the US Geological Survey (USGS) located the quake’s epicentre, some 158km southwest of the capital, at a depth of 51km.
As the earth shook, Mexico’s Popocatepetl volcano, visible from the capital on a clear day, had a small eruption. On its slopes, a church in Atzitzihuacan collapsed during Mass, killing 15 people, Puebla Governor Jose Antonio Gali said.
Residents of Mexico City, a metropolitan region of some 20 million people, slept in the streets while authorities and vol unteers set up tented collection centres to distribute food and water.
Volunteers, soldiers and firefighters formed human chains and dug with hammers and picks to find dustcovered survivors and dead bodies in the remains of apartment buildings, schools and a factory.
With power out in much of the city, the work was carried out in the dark or with flashlights and generators. Rescue workers requested silence as they listened for signs of life.
Authorities said schools would be shut as damage was assessed.
Emergency personnel and equipment were being deployed across affected areas so that ‘‘throughout the night we can continue aiding the population and eventually find people beneath the rubble,’’ Pena Nieto said in a video posted on Facebook.
In Obrera, central Mexico City, people applauded when rescuers managed to retrieve four people alive, with cheers of ‘‘Si se puede’’ — ‘‘Yes we can’’ — ringing out.