Beijing: Two persons were pulled out alive after being buried for over 60 hours in a landslide that struck an industrial estate in China’s Shenzhen city.
The 19-year-old, named Tian Zeming, was rescued by a detachment of the armed police around 6:30 a.m. and rushed to the Guangming New District Central Hospital. Also another person who was badly injured was spotted by the rescuers, who made all efforts to pull him out. He has been gravely injured.
Tian, a migrant worker is in stable condition and has been taken to the operating room to receive a surgical debridement, Wang Guangming, president of the hospital was quoted as saying by state-run Xinhua news agency. One of Tian’s ankles had been stuck in the debris and medical experts are doing their best to save his foot, Wang added.
Tian was among the previously reported 76 missing in the landslide. Rescuers and armed police identified the exact location of Tian at 1 a.m. today in a collapsed factory building, and found him at 3:30 a.m. Tian told rescuers his name and said that there was another survivor near him. Firefighters had to squeeze into the narrow room around Tian and remove the debris by hands, Zhang Yabin, an armed police participating in the rescue said.
Before he was pulled out, Tian had been given oxygen and received intravenous infusion, Zhang said. However, the person beside Tian was pronounced dead by the doctors after he was retrieved, according to rescuers. Yesterday another body was pulled out. A nearby section of the West-to-East natural gas pipeline exploded after the landslide struck the Hengtaiyu industrial park on December 20, causing more than 100,000 square meters of debris.
Videos on China’s social media showed vast amounts of red mud pouring into the city with huge noise engulfing building after building. The mud slide slowed down as it approached the main area of the estate providing time for many people to escape bringing down the casualties.
China’s cabinet has set up a team to investigate the disaster, state broadcaster CCTV said. The team will be headed by the minister of land resources. Meanwhile, tempers are rising over the pace of rescue operations as relatives became anxious over the fate of their loved ones engulfed by the landslide.
