Boy rescued four days after Japan quake

TOKYO: Hopes swelled across Japan yesterday when a two-year-old boy was pulled to safety on live TV after surviving four days buried in a landslide caused by a powerful earthquake. But the joy soon became muted as rescuers recovered the body of his dead mother, and his sister’s fate looked increasingly grim. In a dramatic rescue aired nationwide, Yuta Minagawa emerged in the arms of an orange-clad rescue worker — weakened, awash in mud, but visibly conscious. Television cameras had tracked rescuers painstakingly digging in response to a voice coming from the white van, which was buried Saturday in an avalanche of boulders and earth during a 6.8-magnitude quake in rural Niigata Prefecture (state). “The area was crushed by a large rock, and Yuta just happened to find a 3-foot opening and was standing up by himself,” said Mitsuo Kiyotsuka, one of the rescuers, smiling in wonder. “We’d been telling ourselves we’d get them out. But then he appeared and it was like, ‘Can this be true?”’

Officials at Nagaoka Red Cross Hospital later said the boy was suffering from dehydration, hypothermia and a large gash on his head, but was in stable condition. NHK public broadcaster quoted the toddler telling his father that he had drunk milk in the car, and he asked for melons and water at the hospital. Hours later, the body of his mother, Takako, 39, was pulled from the wreckage and airlifted to a nearby hospital, where she was pronounced dead, raising the death toll from Saturday’s quake to 32 according to National Police Agency statistics. Rescuers had initially thought they could hear her voice from the van, but hospital officials said doctors believed she died instantly from the impact of the landslide. The search for three-year-old Mayu, Taku’s sister, continued in darkness late Wednesday, but the outlook was grim. Temperatures plunged to about eight degrees Celsius in the mountainous region some 250 kilometres north of Tokyo.

Media reports cited disaster officials saying heat-sensitive sensors were unable to detect Mayu’s body and she hadn’t responded to their calls. Kyodo News agency reported that rescuers had spotted her body in the car but it showed no vital signs, such as a pulse. Though the jubilation was increasingly tempered, Yuta’s surprise rescue was greeted as a miracle amid the wreckage of Saturday’s earthquake — the deadliest to hit Japan since 1995 when a 7.2-magnitude temblor killed 6,000 people in the western city of Kobe. The family drew intense interest in Japan as TV stations showed the desperate attempts by Yuta’s father, who had been working in Tokyo at the time of the quake, to track down the family. When the white van was spotted on the devastated hillside Tuesday, it raised hopes of some good news amid a public rattled by ongoing aftershocks and the widespread devastation. Evacuated residents staying at public shelters watched intently as the rescue unfolded on television, praying for the family’s safety.

The rescue operation itself was threatened by aftershocks that shook the treacherous landscape. Workers froze and pulled back when a 6.1-magnitude quake rocked the region yesterday morning, followed by a 4.2-magnitude aftershock about 25 minutes later. They were forced to temporarily call off the search during the afternoon to find safer ground, though later resumed. More than 440 aftershocks have been recorded since Saturday, including four of magnitude-6 or higher, although they were becoming less frequent. Meanwhile, 100,000 residents remain in public shelters following Saturday’s quake amid fears that the aftershocks could trigger more landslides. Thousands more camped out in tents and cars, too afraid to return home. With many roads still blocked by landslides and ruined roads, relief workers in helicopters and cars struggled to get emergency goods to isolated hamlets and overcrowded evacuation centres.