Earthquake death toll rises to 30,000

Earthquake death toll rises to 30,000

Randeep Ramesh in Rawalakot
Monday October 10, 2005
The Guardian

More than 30,000 people were killed by this weekend's powerful earthquake centred below the Hindu Kush mountain range in Pakistan, sending shockwaves across south Asia and reducing cities and villages to rubble.

The majority of the deaths from the quake, which measured 7.7 on the Richter scale and struck early Saturday morning, were in Pakistan. One state minister estimated that 30,000 people were killed in Pakistani Kashmir alone. In Indian Kashmir more than 600 were reported dead. At least 50,000 were believed to be injured. The UN estimated that more than 2.5 million people needed shelter.

Villagers were working through the night, often with their bare hands, to clear the rubble of collapsed buildings as they struggled to save the victims of the disaster. Rescue teams were scrambling last night to reach remote parts of the region.

Pakistan's president, General Pervez Musharraf, flew over the region to see for himself the extent of the devastation, touring the country's mountainous border, which is now cut off from the rest of the country.

He was reported to have been shocked at the levelling of Balakot a town in North-West Frontier Province, where 70% of homes have been destroyed. The president appealed for international help, especially for tents, medicines and blankets, in what he said was the "biggest tragedy" in his country's 58-year history.

George Bush, who counts the Pakistani president as a key ally in the US-led war against terrorism, said assistance would be provided as needed. "My thoughts and prayers are with those affected by this horrible tragedy," he said in a statement.

The Queen expressed her heartfelt sympathy and Tony Blair pledged UK assistance.

The quake flattened dozens of villages. It killed farmers, students, soldiers and schoolchildren, and triggered landslides that blocked rescuers from many areas where bodies lay in streets.

Six US army helicopters are expected to arrive today to airlift the injured from the worst-hit city, the capital of Pakistani Kashmir, Muzaffarabad, where 11,000 people died. The city's cricket stadium was being used to house the homeless and offer relief to the survivors.

There was also widespread destruction in Rawalakot, Bagh and the numerous hill settlements throughout Pakistani Kashmir. Officials said to rebuild all the roads and buildings in the country would need hundreds of millions of dollars of aid. The World Bank immediately pledged £11.3m for reconstruction.

The quake and its aftershocks were felt from central Afghanistan to western Bangladesh. Buildings were wrecked in an area spanning at least 250 miles from Jalalabad in Afghanistan to Srinagar in Indian Kashmir.

Many survivors were left without shelter in near-freezing nighttime temperatures. In India's portion of Kashmir, villagers burned wood from their collapsed homes for warmth.

The tragedy sparked a bout of earthquake diplomacy, with Indian and Pakistani leaders pledging to work together across the line of control which divides the territory.

The "peace bridge", opened earlier this year, to ferry divided families across the de facto border was badly damaged and officials in both countries said its repair would be a priority.

In the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, faint voices, deep within a 12-metre mound of concrete that was a 10-storey building until Saturday, alerted rescuers to two survivors - a boy and a woman. There were believed to be dozens of bodies beneath the rubble.

There were warnings from relief agencies that children could make up half the population of the quake-affected areas and would be vulnerable to hunger, cold, illness and trauma. On the roads into the foothills of the Himalayas from Islamabad displaced villagers had gathered for shelter.

"We lost everything we had in just one minute. My shop is done. My house is gone and now we have to wait here without anything," said Mohammed Habib, who was with his five children, sitting on a road above the Jhelum river.

The Guardian was the first western news organisation to reach Rawalakot, a normally bustling market town in Pakistani Kashmir, 87 miles from Islam. It is also home to a brigade of the Pakistani army. Perched in the the western Himalayas, the town's university, law courts and shopping market had collapsed, encasing hundreds of bodies in tombs of brick, wood and concrete.

Locals said there was no electricity to give them light, no running water for bathing and cooking, no working landlines on which to phone family and friends or get out the word about the rapidly deteriorating conditions.

"We are completely cut off and there is no help. No agencies. No government. No doctors. We have been left to fend for ourselves and we need help," said Aziz Khan, a resident of a nearby village, who came to Rawalakot to look for a family friend.

"In our village 300 buildings have been damaged so badly that nobody wants to stay in them."

Rawalakot's civil military hospital crumpled seconds after the quake struck, crushing patients and depriving the local area of its primary medical centre at the moment when thousands would be in need of surgery and emergency care.

The site was sealed off by troops yesterday who refused to answer questions about the whereabouts of recovered bodies.

In the university, former students were pulling corpses from the wreckage but were angry with authorities, who they perceived to be tardy in responding to the devastation. The army had just arrived and a helicopter was unloading supplies in the afternoon for a relief operation.

"Although it was Saturday the classes were going on so there could be hundreds in there," said Muhammad Alam, 18, an engineering student at the university. "The thing is without the right equipment we will never get them out."