[DIPECHO Network] Thousands flee China quake area over flood fears

[List Moderator [ICIMOD-DIPECHO Network]]

Dear all,

Forwarding a news item from China, where thousands of people are fleeing
earthquake area over flood fear when two rivers are blocked by landslides.
Also, compounding the horror for survivors, a lake rising behind the wall of
debris threatens to break its banks and send torrents cascading into
villages downstream.

Please find below the news in detail.

With best regards,
List moderator


Thousands flee China quake area over flood fears
Source:
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gBr_dOzJ9Pnc_U9gSgtTgE-cR-KwD90NREQ00

By TINI TRAN –

DONGHEKOU, China (AP) — Two rivers blocked by landslides threatened to flood
towns shattered by China's massive earthquake, sending thousands of
survivors fleeing Saturday in a region still staggering from the country's
worst disaster in 30 years.

A mountain sheared off by the mighty tremor cut the Qingzhu river and
swallowed the riverside village of Donghekou whole, entombing an unknown
number of people inside a huge mound of brown earth.

Compounding the horror for survivors, a lake rising behind the wall of
debris threatens to break its banks and send torrents cascading into
villages downstream.

Pannicky residents streamed out of the entire county on the northern edge of
the quake zone, spurred on by mobile phone text messages sent en masse by
local government officials warning that the water level was rising and
people downstream were being evacuated.

In the town of Beichuan, 60 miles to the south, thousands fled as the
reports circulated.

Also on Sunday, a "slightly bruised" man was pulled out alive from a
collapsed hospital in Beichuan after being trapped for 139 hours after the
quake, a state news agency reported.

The official Xinhua News Agency said Tang Xiong was pulled to safety from
the collapsed hospital in Beichuan in the northern part of Sichuan province.

It said Tang "was only slightly bruised and in his right senses" when he was
found.

Xinhua also said a second man was rescued from a different building in
Beichuan about eight hours before Tang. It said the survivor, Wu Jianping,
had been taken to hospital. His condition was not known.

Rescue work had been resumed later in the day and experts were monitoring
the river above Beichuan, the People's Daily newspaper said on its web site.
The swift exodus underscored the jitters running through the disaster zone.
A strong aftershock — the second in two days and measured by the U.S.
Geological Survey at magnitude 5.7 — shook the area early Sunday for 45
seconds, causing people to run into the streets.

In all the devastation wrought by the quake, little looks as bleak as
Donghekou.

The road to the village ends in a tangled twist of metal and tar. In the
small valley below, the village itself has disappeared when the mountain
collapsed. Locals said two other villages further upstream, Ciban and
Kangle, had suffered the same fate. The three villages were home to about
300 families, locals said.

Eerie and still, the remaining landscape has few signs of human life — a
soiled green floral scarf, a rubber pipe, a log.

"Oh God! I have lost everything," said Wen Xiaoying, 32, whose voice shook
as she surveyed the valley below for the first time since returning from
far-off Guangdong province where she worked.

She held up one hand as she ticked off the family members that died — her
father, her mother, her sister and her brother-in-law — all of them buried
somewhere in the muck before her.

"When I saw them the last time, we celebrated together," said Wen, a glimmer
of a smile showing through as she remembered happier days. "I didn't expect
it would be the last time I saw them."

Su Ciyao trudged over the bend in plastic slippers, carrying a plastic rice
bag stuffed with salvaged clothes.

"My village is over there," the 44-year-old said, gesturing to the swollen
earth behind him. Asked where his family was, he could only shake his head.

"Only me," he said, and then set off without a backward glance.

Drizzling rain in the valley added to the gloom, and to the fear of carloads
of people who clogged the twisting mountain roads as they streamed out of
the region.

The government's daily update added another few thousand bodies to the death
toll as it continued climbing toward an expected final tally of at least
50,000. Cabinet spokesman Guo Weimin said 28,881 deaths have been confirmed
so far.

The official Xinhua News Agency, citing regional officials, said more than
10,600 people were known to be still buried almost one week after the 7.9
magnitude quake hit, shattering thousands of buildings in dozens of towns
and cities in Sichuan province.

A group of about 15 people surrounded an Associated Press reporter at a
gasoline station in Miangyang city Sunday, appealing for help for their
village, Xiushui.

"The government is doing nothing to help us," said one man who identified
himself only by his surname, Chen. "If I gave you my complete name the
government would track me down."

He said Xiushui was about 12 miles from Mianyang, which is north of Chengdu.
Chen did not say how many people lived there, handing over a note which said
it had been signed "by the people of Xiushui."

"Please go to our village of Xiushui to cover the situation. The government
is doing nothing to help us get water or housing," the note said.

More than 200 rescuers from Japan, Russia, South Korea and Singapore are
searching alongside Chinese soldiers.

More international aid was arriving, with a U.S. Air Force cargo plane
loaded with tents, lanterns and 15,000 meals landing Sunday in the Sichuan
provincial capital of Chengdu.

"We are extending the helping hand of a friend to you in the aftermath of
this terrible earthquake," U.S. Gen. Charles Hooper said.

The number of security forces helping victims rose to almost 150,000, and
the government added cash payments to victims to its response.

The government would give $715 in compensation to each family that lost a
member in the earthquake, China National Radio reported Saturday on its web
site. At a State Council meeting hosted by Premier Wen Jiabao in Beijing,
the government also decided it would also hand out a daily ration of food
and $1.40 to survivors, the report said.

Almost a week after the quake struck, rescues were still occurring.

Rescuers pulled at least seven more survivors from collapsed buildings, the
last a man saved after 128 hours. Both of his legs had to be amputated.
Another, 20-year-old highway worker Jiang Yuhang was pulled free shortly
after his mother arrived from a neighboring province.

"I was expecting to see my son's body. I never expected to see him alive,"
his mother, Long Jinyu, said on state television.

Experts say buried earthquake survivors can last a week or more, depending
on factors including the temperature and whether they have water to drink,
but that the chances of survival diminish rapidly after the first 24 hours.

Nearly a week after the quake, soldiers who first arrived with little but
shovels were better supplied. In the town of Yinghua, rescuers worked
through the day, using saws, drills, torches and hands, to free 31-year-old
Bian Gengfeng from the wreckage of a six-story chemical factory.

A man rescued from the same site Friday told rescuers that he had been
talking with a woman still trapped, setting off Saturday's effort.

"Uncle called me yesterday and said 'mom was alive' and I should come and
wait here," said 10-year-old Luo Ting, who watched her mother being rescued.

Xinhua said Russian rescuers had found a 61-year-old woman alive late
Saturday after being buried for 127 hours, the first survivor found by
foreign workers.

"I express heartfelt thanks to the foreign governments and international
friends that have contributed to our quake relief work," Chinese President
Hu Jintao was quoted as saying by Xinhua Sunday.

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