The death toll from Sunday’s landslides and flooding in northwestern China doubled on Tuesday to 702, officials said, even as rescuers dug through the rubble, some with their bare hands, in search of the 1,042 people still missing.
Sunday’s flooding in the predominantly Tibetan county of Zhouqu, in Gansu province, is among the worst China has seen in a decade. The remote and inaccessible terrain, officials said, has hampered rescue efforts, with limited supplies and insufficient space to pitch rescue tents.
As hope faded for the missing on the third day of rescue operations, one 52-year-old man was rescued from the ruins after being trapped underground for more than 50 hours — a brief moment of light for rescue workers in a day of darkness.
Rough terrain hinders efforts
Seven thousand troops of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) have been sent to the affected areas. But their efforts have been hindered by the tough terrain, official reports said. The death toll in a single day, doubled from 337 on Monday night, to 702 as of Tuesday evening.
With 1,243 people rescued, 1,042 still missing and 42 in serious condition, rescuers could only set up two settlement centres on the playgrounds of two local middle-schools, the official Xinhua news agency reported. Around 16,000 tents have been sent to the provincial capital Lanzhou, but the difficult access to Zhouqu meant only 4,443 have reached the affected site. Only 100 tents had been set up at the two settlement centres, Xinhua reported. “We have adequate tents, but insufficient space to pitch them,” said Zhang Hongdong of the Red Cross Society.
On Tuesday, the Ministry of Finance said it had marked 500 million yuan ($74 million) to support relief work. The government has said all those who lost their homes would be resettled by June 2011.
