Some hope found in search for quake survivors
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Ali Akbar Dareini
Associated Press
Dec. 30, 2003 12:00 AM
BAM, Iran - As search crews despaired of finding more survivors from Iran's devastating earthquake, Monday brought moments of hope: Rescuers pulled a girl out alive from the rubble of her house, and three men believed dead stirred in their white burial shrouds.
More than 25,000 bodies have been retrieved since Friday's 6.6-magnitude quake shook the ancient city of Bam and its surrounding region in southeastern Iran, according to provincial government spokesman Asadollah Iranmanesh. At least 10,000 people were believed injured.
Two aftershocks early Monday terrified survivors and toppled some of the few walls still standing in this city.
There were fears Monday that the number of dead could rise as high as 40,000 as Bam passed the critical mark of 72 hours after the quake, the longest period people are expected to survive in rubble.
"Many, many more people remain buried under the rubble," the government spokesman said.
International rescue teams joined Iranian crews in searching the wreckage, listening for tapping sounds from anyone trapped below and monitoring reactions of sniffer dogs. Some teams prepared to leave today, but others vowed to stay.
"There have been miracles in earthquakes before, in other cities, in other countries, and so we must continue searching," Eric Soupra, a spokesman for French rescuers, told France's RTL radio.
In a reward for such perseverance, an Iranian relief worker described how people approached him about a house that had not been searched. Using an electronic device, Shokrollah Abbasi and three colleagues found a girl, unconscious and with a broken leg.
"The only reason she remained alive was because the roof had not totally collapsed," Abbasi said. "There was air for her to breathe."
The bodies of a woman and boy were found nearby. The girl, who appeared to be about 12, was flown to another city for hospital care.
At the Bam cemetery, the overwhelming number of bodies made it necessary to bury some victims in mass graves hollowed out by bulldozers.
In the haste and confusion, mistakes were made.
A clergyman from the seminary town of Qom described how three times in the space of five hours Monday, he was reciting the final prayers for unidentified men wrapped in shrouds when their bodies moved.
The first time it happened, "my friends were taking the body to place it in the grave," cleric Hojatoleslam Mojtaba Zonnor said.
"Then they thought there was a movement. They called a doctor. After a brief examination, the doctor said, 'He's not dead, he's alive.' "
Dennis
