Toddler survives China building collapse, in dead father’s embrace
Rescuers carry little Wu Ningxi from the rubble 15 hours after several buildings collapsed in eastern China. She came through the collapse that killed 22 — her parents among the dead — with only minor cuts and bruises.
For 15 hours, the rescuers dug. Sifting through rubble and pulling bodies from the pile of cement and twisted metal where several homes had once stood. The rescue workers were dressed in orange jumpsuits, hard hats, safety goggles and surgical masks. Their numbers quickly swelled i nto the hundreds after the buildings came down at 4 a. m. on Monday and a painstaking search for survivors — in a corner of eastern China where building collapses are not uncommon and building codes don’t seem to exist — began to unfold.
After 15 hours of digging, some hope: a little girl, her hair coated in dust, limp, but alive. Her father’s shattered body was draped above her in a final life- saving em- brace. His neck was bent and presumably broken. His dead wife lay nearby. “The child was able to survive entirely thanks to the fact that her dad used his own flesh and blood to prop up a life- saving space for his daughter,” a rescuer told the China Youth Daily.
By Tuesday, the search for survivors was over. Six had been saved, including the little girl, who has since been identified by Chinese news agencies as Wu Ningxi. She escaped the collapse with minor cuts and bruises. Her parents were counted among the 22 dead. The collapsed buildings were located in an industrial area on the outskirts of Wenzhou, and home to migrant workers. The little girl’s father worked at a shoe factory. Built in the 1970s, the homes had undergone extensive renovations in recent years, according to reports, with more storeys being added and more and more people crowding into them.
One survivor told Chinese media that he shared a single room with four coworkers — and his boss. The cause of the collapse is under investigation, while nearby structures are to be demolished as a safety precaution.
China’s cities have swelled in population in recent decades, a time of mass urbanization that has triggered a corresponding boom in hastily built homes to house the influx of jobhungry workers. Collapses have become just another part of the news cycle. A landslide in May swept away a residential building in Guizhou province, killing 16. Another two were killed and 24 injured in April when a market building collapsed in Foshan city.
Now 22 more are gone, while a little girl remains, orphaned by the final act of a 26- year- old father — desperate to keep his baby safe.