RESCUERS CONTINUED yesterday to extract survivors from the rubble of Port-au-Prince a week after the earthquake, generating rare glimpses of joy amid the desolation in Haiti’s capital.
Haitian fire crews and international teams had expected to focus on the recovery of corpses by now but were instead still digging for the living after a child and several adults were discovered in remarkably good condition in and near the city.
A young boy named Kiki emerged with a grin and arms outstretched after being extracted from the ruins of his home in the Nazan area of the Haitian capital on Tuesday.
At least four adults were also pulled from debris in Port-au-Prince the same day and early Wednesday, confounding expectations that few if any people could survive more than a week trapped under collapsed concrete.
“The only word is miracle. She is not just alive, she seems in perfect condition,” said Dunat Shahin, a member of a Turkish rescue team digging out a 26-year-old woman from the shattered roof of the three-storey Olympic market in Rue Lalu.
“She is talking in wonderfully logical sentences,” he added, wiping sweat from a face plastered grey with dust.
Scavengers heard the woman’s voice at around 1pm on Tuesday and alerted rescuers. The Turkish team, along with French, Haitian and later US help, used drills and pickaxes to widen a hole in what became an 11-hour extraction operation.
Before reaching the woman, who gave her name only as Natalie, they removed the body of a woman who was also wedged between two collapsed floors but in a different compartment. The stench of death suggested other corpses nearby. “Natalie can smell everything but can’t really see anything,” said Mr Shahin.
Natalie was hauled out shortly before midnight – seven hours and seven days after the magnitude seven quake. Dusty and weak but apparently unhurt, she greeted her rescuers with a smile and, implausibly, a song.
The 26-year-old was the 73rd confirmed “live extraction” made by international teams.
“The fact that people trapped in small spaces with little or no food and water have survived so long speaks to the resilience of the Haitian people,” said Rebecca Gustafson, of US Aid.
“Eventually this will turn into a recovery effort but right now we’re looking for survivors. In this response, anything is possible.”
Across town two more women were pulled from a collapsed university building, while in another part of the capital a Mexican-led team freed Ena Zizi, a 69-year-old who was attending a meeting at the residence of Haiti’s Catholic archbishop when the earthquake struck.
In the darkness she had spoken with a priest who also was trapped but he fell silent after a few days, leaving her alone.
“I talked only to my boss, God,” she said, lying on a foil thermal blanket, her hair coated in white dust. “And I didn’t need any more humans.”
Doctors said Ms Zizi was dehydrated and had a dislocated hip and a broken leg.
“I’m all right, sort of,” she said. – (Guardian service)