Source: CCTV.com

06-21-2008 16:09

Special Report:   Documentary: The Earthquake

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This is a rescue scene that took place in Beichuan County on May 12. We can see the armed police in green uniforms rushing into the auditorium to rescue people and from this moment on, the green uniform became one of the most noticeable and impressive symbols of the earthquake rescue effort.

A 100,000-strong rescue force gathered from all directions and headed toward the disaster area. Within less than 48 hours, the military had traveled deep into all the counties hit by the earthquake and had begun to carry out rescue work. The green uniforms of the soldiers can be seen in almost every rescue scene.

Despite the well-coordinated relief effort, the rescue workers faced blocked roads caused by mountain landslides and mudslides which resulted in dozens of towns and hundreds of villages being isolated from the outside world and leaving local residents stuck with no access to the rescue forces. Even more worryingly, the mountain land and mudslides caused earthquake lakes to appear. The condition of the roads made it impossible for vehicles to access these isolated places, so the rescue forces had no choice but march on foot over mountains and rivers to carry out their search and rescue mission. Their target was to reach into every earthquake-struck village in order to save every life in danger as quickly as possible.

The rescue forces gave their all in their attempt to provide aid and relief to all those in need. Chengdu Military Area sent an engineering team on an emergency mission to help those in danger out to safer places and the air force and the army’s air regiment sent out helicopters to air-drop provisions to the disaster zone and help relocate the wounded.

This flight was on a mission to transport the wounded. One of the wounded included a soldier from the rescue force itself.

We don’t know this soldier’s name. All we know is that he was stung by poisonous bees when trying to rescue people in danger and he passed out as a result.

Right after helping the unconscious soldier up on to the helicopter, Yi Kaihong, an air force officer, passed out due of exhaustion. He was sent to the emergency room of a Chengdu hospital where several wounded officers and soldiers were already getting treatment.

Yi Kaihong was sad because they had been forced out of the frontline while his comrades-in-arms were fighting against the clock and his fellow Chinese were waiting desperately for help.

As time passed, more and more people in the earthquake zone were rescued but as the first 72 hours after the quake was considered the critical rescue time, the passing of time also meant that time was running out and it was becoming more and more difficult to find survivors.

Together with other rescue personnel, the marines threw themselves into the rescue work. Right at this moment, another aftershock caused even more buildings to collapse.

The signs of life underneath the ruins became weaker and weaker and as the rescue staff rushed into the dangerous building again and again at the risk of their own life, another aftershock happened.

The constant aftershocks meant that any signs of life remaining were getting weaker and weaker. By 9pm, the rescue staff had been fighting for 12 hours but were determined not to give up. Their persistence produced results and one miracle after another even as much as 100 hours after the earthquake had initially struck.

The soldiers rescued these survivors one after the other but now they were also concerned about the future of these victims.

Right after surgery, Dr. He, together with his teammates from the Navy’s medical team went to 404 Hospital in Mianyang City to see a special patient.

The patient Dr. He and his colleagues went to see was Qu Yue. The earthquake on May 12 caused the ground floor of her school building to collapse, and her left leg became trapped by a heavy wall. After four days of rescue efforts, the rescue crew was still unable to get her out of the rubble and there were still another six children waiting to be rescued. In order to save her life, Dr He was forced to amputate her leg on the spot. Qu Yue loved ballet and now the earthquake had destroyed her dream of becoming a ballet dancer. Dr. He and his teammates decided to transport her to a Beijing hospital and would take care of her recovery in the future.

Li Pijun, a political instructor with the Chengdu Armed Police, arrived at Yingxiu Town with his troops on May 13 and has remained on the rescue frontline since then. What many people didn’t realize was that he came from Beichuan County, the area most devastated by the quake, and while he and his comrades-in-arms were making an all-out effort to rescue survivors, he was told that more than a dozen of his family members had died in the quake.

You Sen, an officer with an air force missile regiment, took a rescue assignment, and came to Dujiangyan with a relief crew. He was sent on a mission to a collapsed residential building to search for and rescue survivors.

You Sen didn’t expect that the collapsed residential building would be his actual home and that one of the victims he was to search for would be his mother –in–law.

After 4 hours of searching, no signs of life were found underneath the collapsed residence and the only thing that was certain was that You Sen’s mother-in-law was buried in the ruins of the building.

At this very moment some other rescue crew members had found a survivor in another ruin and upon being given the order, You Sen and his teammates immediately left for the other rescue site in order to help.

The following day and night, You Sen and his teammates pulled three survivors out of the ruins but at the time nobody knew that the collapsed building they had given up on was You Sen’s own home where his mother-in-law was buried.

Three days later, You Sen’s teammates found the body of his mother-in-law in the ruins.

Two days later, You Sen said goodbye to his wife and took another rescue mission in a different county.

While the military green uniforms brought hope to those in need of help, the orange/red colour became a symbol of life. On May 17, 40 rescue professionals from the China Red Cross were ready to leave for the rescue frontline. Before leaving, the rescue crews wrote down their personal information on their orange/red uniforms for identification purposes in case something terrible happened. This rescue team had a slogan: For people in the disaster area, we have nothing to fear. Very quickly, this orange/red became the most eye-catching color on the rescue frontline in the disaster areas. Those wearing the orange/red uniforms were professional rescue people, firefighters and special police. They were responsible for the frontline searching so for those buried beneath the ruins, this colour came to represent hope for life itself.