Rescuers racing against time in quake city

The confirmed death toll from the magnitude 6.3 quake centred near Christchurch rose to 75 yesterday and officials said it was almost sure to climb further. Some 300 people were listed as missing.

Prime Minister John Key declared a national state of emergency as hundreds of soldiers, police and other emergency workers – including specialist teams from around the world – rushed to Christchurch.

Parts of the city of 350,000 people lay in ruins, and all corners of it were suffering cuts to water supplies, power and phones. Time was running out for those still trapped in collapsed buildings

The city was virtually shut down yesterday, with officials urging residents to stay inside their homes. The immediate focus was on about a dozen town centre buildings where finding survivors was still a possibility. In other places, rubble was being left untouched – even if bodies were thought buried there – until the urgency of the survivor search passed.

Cheers erupted as rescue workers pulled a woman from the rubble of the PGG building. Office worker Ann Bodkin was pulled free from the pile of twisted metal and shattered concrete and was quickly reunited with her husband, who had been watching the painstaking rescue.

Near the smouldering remains of the Canterbury TV building, brother and sister Kent and Lizzy Manning sat on a rain-sodden patch of grass waiting for news of their mother, Donna, a TV presenter whom they had not heard from since the quake.

“My mum is superwoman, she’d do anything,” said Lizzy Manning, 18, with tears running down her face.

At that moment, a police official knelt down beside the pair.

“I have some horrible news...” the officer began, before telling the siblings that there was no hope for anyone left trapped inside the building.

The siblings bowed their heads and wept. Their father rushed over and enclosed them in an embrace.

A number of foreign students, who had been eating their lunch at the time of the quake, are thought to be among the dead in the office building, police said, adding they were “100 per cent certain” no-one trapped in the rubble was still alive, including the 15 employees from the TV station who were still unaccounted for.

More than 20 people had been rescued and others had managed to escape.

“We don’t believe this site is now survivable,” police operations commander Insp Dave Lawry said. “The sad fact is we’re removing resources form this site to other sites where there is a higher chance of survivability.

“My heart goes out to those families...knowing that some of their children have probably been killed in this incident. We will do the very best for your people that we can.”

Officials had been using thermal cameras in the wreckage, as sniffer dogs clambered on top looking for signs of life.

Mayor Bob Parker said early yesterday that 120 people were rescued from wrecked buildings as teams worked through the night, while more bodies were also recovered.

About 300 people were still unaccounted for, but this did not mean they were all still trapped, he added.

As the painful trawl for survivors continued, military units patrolled near-empty streets disfigured by the huge cracks and canyons created in Tuesday’s earthquake, the second powerful quake to hit the city in five months.

The quake toppled the spire of the city’s historic stone cathedral and flattened tall buildings.

Mr Parker said an unknown number of people, possibly 20 or more, were believed to have been inside the cathedral tower – climbing it was a popular activity for tourists.