Teen pulled out alive from the rubble 60 hours after landslide in China

Teen rescued Under rubble in china

ATP - A teenager was pulled out of the rubble alive Wednesday morning more than 60 hours after a massive landslide overtook an industrial park in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, the Chinese news agency reported.

Police rescued 19-year-old Tian Zeming and rushed him to a nearby hospital, where doctors worked to save his foot, Wang Guangming, the president of the hospital was quoted by the Chinese Xinhua news agency as saying.

One of Tian’s ankles had been stuck in the debris that overtook 33 buildings in the industrial park at noon on Sunday, Wang said. He said the teenager was in stable condition and had undergone surgery at the Guangming New District Central Hospital.

At least 90 people are missing in the disaster, which has been blamed on a pile of construction waste that built up for over two years. Very few people trapped by the slide were rescued up to a day later, reports said.

Videos showed buildings crumbling to the ground as the liquefied red mud and debris raked through them Sunday. Geysers of debris exploded into the air as the mud swept through the city.

When it was all over, mud as deep as 33 feet covered an area of 450,000 square yards, authorities reported. That’s approximately 70 football fields.

Rescuers identified Tian’s exact location in a collapsed factory building at 1. a.m. Wednesday, Xinhua reported. They rescued him two and a half hours later, the news agency said.

When they located him, Tian told rescuers his name and said there was another survivor near him.

Firefighters squeezed into the narrow space around Tian, clawing through the debris surrounding him by hand, according to Zhang Yabin, a policeman involved in the rescue, Xinhua reported.

Before he was pulled out, the teenager was given oxygen and an intravenous infusion, Zhang said.

The person beside Tian was pronounced dead by doctors after he was retrieved, however, rescuers said.

The Associated Press reported that the slide was caused by the combination of the man-made pile of construction waste coupled with rain.

The mountain of dirt, cement chunks and other construction waste had been piled up against a 330-foot-high hill over the past two years, the news agency reported. Heavy rains then saturated the soil, causing it to collapse with massive force, the AP said.

The State Council, China’s cabinet, set up an investigation team to look into the landslide Wednesday morning, the news agency reported.