Final toll from collapsed Russian building: 39 dead
MOSCOW (AP) — After three-and-a-half days of fighting a mountain of concrete, cold weather and time, rescue teams in an industrial Russian city ended a search for people who were inside an apartment building where an explosion triggered a partial collapse, giving a final death toll Thursday of 39.
The massive operation launched by the Russian Emergencies Ministry in the jumbled maze of rubble where a section of a 10-story building stood in Magnitogorsk until Monday morning combined sophisticated equipment with grueling manual labor.
Russian officials said from the start that emergency crews were racing to reach survivors before they died of hypothermia in temperatures as low as minus 29 degrees Celsius (-20 F). Supervisors ordered fans to blow warm air into the wreckage while drones, flexible ocular devices and the hands of hundreds probed for signs of life.
A search dog brought hope to the grim work Tuesday when it pointed to a place where rescue workers would hear the cries of a baby. The 10-month-old boy who was pulled out 35 hours after the building came down ended up being the only person found alive in the debris.
The child was airlifted 1400 kilometers (870 miles) miles to a top hospital in Moscow with severe injuries that included fractures, frostbite and the combination of shock and kidney damage that doctors call “crush syndrome.” He was in stable condition Thursday, the Health Ministry said.
A cat was found alive on Wednesday, but that did not provide much solace as search crews discovered more and more bodies. The number of victims grew from four on Monday and kept mounting until the search ended Thursday night.
“We took out the last, the 39th body today and we guarantee that there are no more people in the building,” Deputy Emergencies Minister Alexander Chuprian told reporters.