‘We need aid’: rescuers in earthquake-hit Myanmar city plead for help as death toll passes 1 000

The death toll from a huge earthquake that hit Myanmar and Thailand passed 1 000 on Saturday, as rescuers dug through the rubble of collapsed buildings in a desperate search for survivors.

The shallow 7.7-magnitude quake struck northwest of the city of Sagaing in central Myanmar in the early afternoon, followed minutes later by a 6.7-magnitude aftershock.

The quake destroyed buildings, downed bridges, and buckled roads across swathes of Myanmar, with severe damage reported in the second biggest city, Mandalay.

A statement from the ruling junta’s information team said 1 002 people are known to have died, with 2 376 injured.

But with communications badly disrupted, the true scale of the disaster has yet to emerge from the isolated military-ruled state, and the toll is expected to rise significantly.

It was the biggest quake to hit Myanmar in over a century, according to US geologists, and the tremors were powerful enough to severely damage buildings across Bangkok, hundreds of kilometres (miles) away from the epicentre.

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A plea for help

Exhausted, overwhelmed rescuers in Myanmar’s second-biggest city pleaded for help Saturday as they struggled to free hundreds of people trapped in buildings destroyed by a devastating earthquake.

In Mandalay, the country’s cultural capital and home to more than 1.7 million people, a monastery’s clock tower lay collapsed on its side, its hands pointing to 12:55 pm – just minutes after the time the quake struck.

Among the worst-hit buildings in the city is the Sky Villa Condominium development, where more than 90 people are feared to be trapped.

The quake reduced the building’s 12 storeys to six, and the cracked pastel green walls of the upper floors perched on the crushed remains of the lower levels.

A woman’s body stuck out of the wreckage, her arm and hair hanging down.

Rescuers clambered over the ruins, painstakingly removing pieces of rubble and wreckage by hand as they sought to open up passageways to those trapped inside.

Scattered around were the remains of people’s lives – a child’s plastic bunny toy, pieces of furniture and a picture of the New York skyline.

Some residents sheltered under the shade of nearby trees, where they had spent the night, a few possessions they had managed to salvage – blankets, motorbike helmets – alongside them.

Elsewhere, rescuers in flip-flops and minimal protective equipment picked by hand over the remains of buildings, shouting into the rubble in the hope of hearing the answering cry of a survivor.

“There are many victims in condo apartments. More than 100 were pulled out last night,” one rescue worker who requested anonymity told AFP.

Carrying bodies by truck

Widespread power cuts have hampered rescue efforts, with emergency personnel relying on portable generators for power.

After more than 24 hours of desperate searching, many are exhausted and desperate for relief.

“We have been here since last night. We haven’t got any sleep. More help is needed here,” the rescue worker told AFP.

“We have enough manpower but we don’t have enough cars. We are transporting dead bodies using light trucks. About 10-20 bodies in one light truck.”

Myanmar is accustomed to regular earthquakes, bisected north to south by the active Sagaing Fault, but the violent fury of Friday’s quake was exceptional.

The country’s ability to cope with the aftermath of the quake will be hampered by the effects of four years of civil war, which have ravaged the country’s healthcare and emergency systems.

In an indication of the potential enormity of the crisis, the junta has issued an exceptionally rare call for international aid.

Previous military rulers have spurned all foreign assistance, even after major natural disasters.

“We need aid. We don’t have enough of anything,” resident Thar Aye, 68, told AFP.

“I feel so sad to see this tragic situation. I’ve never experienced anything like this before.”

Myanmar declared a state of emergency across its six worst-affected regions after the quake, and at one major hospital in the capital, Naypyidaw, medics were forced to treat the wounded in the open air.

One official described it as a “mass casualty area”.

“I haven’t seen (something) like this before. We are trying to handle the situation. I’m so exhausted now,” a doctor told AFP.

‘Everyone was screaming’

“Yesterday, when the earthquake happened, I was in my home. It was quite scary,” Mandalay resident Ba Chit, 55, told AFP.

“My family members are safe, but other people were affected. I feel so sorry for them. I feel very sad to see this kind of situation.”

French tourist Augustin Gus was shopping for a t-shirt in one of Bangkok’s many malls when the massive quake began shaking the building in the Thai capital.

“Just when I left the elevator, the earth starts moving. I thought it was me… it was not me,” the 23-year-old told AFP.

“Everyone was screaming and running, so I started screaming as well.”

For many tourists who flocked to the popular destination, the quake was a disconcerting experience.

Some were lazing in rooftop pools when the powerful shaking began to slop the water off the edge of high-rise buildings.

Others were left stranded in the streets with their luggage when the city’s metro and light-rail system shut down for safety checks after the quake.

The city’s residents, unused to earthquakes, were not able to offer much guidance, said one business traveller from the Solomon Islands, who asked not to be named.

“Unfortunately there were no procedures in place” during his evacuation from the 21st floor of a Bangkok skyscraper on Friday.

“So everyone was getting confused,” he said. “I just wanted to get out.”

Cristina Mangion, 31, from Malta, was in her hotel bed when the shaking began.

“I thought I was feeling dizzy from the heat,” she told AFP.

Hotel staff came to knock at the doors of each room to offer help, and Mangion’s father quickly messaged to check she was okay.

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Digging for survivors in Thailand

Rescuers in the Thai capital laboured through the night searching for workers trapped when a 30-storey skyscraper under construction collapsed, reduced in seconds to a pile of rubble and twisted metal by the force of the shaking.

Bangkok governor Chadchart Sittipunt told AFP that around 10 people had been confirmed killed across the city, most in the skyscraper collapse.

But up to 100 workers were still unaccounted for at the building, close to the Chatuchak weekend market that is a magnet for tourists.

“We are doing our best with the resources we have because every life matters,” Chadchart told reporters at the scene.

“Our priority is acting as quickly as possible to save them all.”

Bangkok city authorities said they will deploy more than 100 engineers to inspect buildings for safety after receiving over 2,000 reports of damage.

Up to 400 people were forced to spend the night in the open air in city parks as their homes were not safe to return to, Chadchart said.

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Significant quakes are extremely rare in Bangkok, and Friday’s tremors sent shoppers and workers rushing into the street in alarm across the city.

While there was no widespread destruction, the shaking brought some dramatic images of rooftop swimming pools sloshing their contents down the side of many of the city’s towering apartment blocks and hotels.

Even hospitals were evacuated, with one woman delivering her baby outdoors after being moved from a hospital building. A surgeon also continued to operate on a patient after evacuating, completing the operation outside, a spokesman told AFP.

Calls for assistance answered

Offers of foreign assistance have began coming in, with President Donald Trump on Friday pledging US help.

“It’s terrible,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office about the quake when asked if he would respond to the appeal by Myanmar’s military rulers.

“It’s a real bad one, and we will be helping. We’ve already spoken with the country.”

China, India, France, Malaysia, South Korea, New Zealand, and the European Union are among those who have offered to provide assistance, while the WHO said it was mobilising to prepare trauma injury supplies.