Two rescued two days after deadly earthquake in Taiwan
Two survivors were pulled out from a toppled high-rise building in Taiwan, two days after a powerful earthquake that killed at least 37 people.
Taiwan’s Eastern Broadcasting Corporation reported that Tsao Wei-ling called out “here I am” as rescuers dug through to find her.
A male survivor, Lee Tsung-tien, 42, was pulled out conscious from the sixth floor section of the 17-storey building.
Rescuers also found signs of life from a 28-year-old woman who is a migrant worker and an eight-year-old girl, both conscious but trapped in the fifth-floor section, according to a notice posted at a rescue information centre on site.
More than 100 people are believed to be still buried in the collapsed building from a disaster that struck during the most important family holiday in the Chinese calendar – the Lunar New Year.
Family members of the missing continued to flood into the information centre in search of their loved ones or sit by anxiously. Some of them walked around with green name cards around their necks indicating their missing relative’s name and location in the building.
The government in Tainan, the worst-hit city, said that more than 170 people had been rescued from the 17-storey building, which folded like an accordion after the earthquake struck.
“It was all topsy-turvy. You couldn’t even tell where the ceiling was,” a 15-year-old survivor, only identified by his surname, Hu, said on EBC Television.
He said he had crawled out of a window to alert rescuers to his parents’ location, and they were rescued soon after the earthquake.
The death toll from Saturday’s powerful 6.4-magnitude quake in south Taiwan stood at 37.
Rescuers said Mrs Tsao was found under the body of her husband, who had shielded her from a collapsed beam, Taiwan’s government-run Central News Agency reported. Her husband and two-year-son were found dead, while five members of her family remained unaccounted for, it said.
Earthquakes frequently hit Taiwan, but most are minor and cause little or no damage, though a magnitude-7.6 quake in 1999 killed more than 2,300 people.
The spectacular fall of the high-rise, built in 1989, raised questions about whether its construction had been flawed.
Tainan’s government said the building had not been listed as a dangerous structure, and Taiwan’s interior minister, Chen Wei-zen, said an investigation would examine whether the developer had cut corners.
The extended Lunar New Year holiday officially started on Monday, but celebrations were subdued.
Both President Ma Ying-jeou and President-elect Tsai Ing-wen cancelled the handing out of envelopes of cash in their home towns, a holiday tradition for Taiwan’s leader.
