In the early morning of December 19, in Jintian Village, Haidong citizens and Hui Tu Autonomous County, Qinghai Province, Mr. Yang, who was avoiding the earthquake in the yard with his family, suddenly heard the sound of a tree falling. As one of the walls of the courtyard collapsed, muddy water poured over them from all sides. Mr Yang shouted "Run!" He picked up his six-year-old daughter and ran outside. Running to the relative safety of the street, Mr. Yang looked back and saw no trace of his wife, mother, grandmother and a relative who was staying at home.

Shortly after the 6.2-magnitude earthquake occurred in Jishishan County, Linxia, Gansu province, Jintian Village and Caotan Village, Zhongchuan Township, Minhe County, caused the "sand swell" phenomenon, a large number of houses were surrounded by silt and washed away. As of 20:56 on December 20, the earthquake has killed 22 people in Haidong City, Qinghai province, 198 people were injured, 12 people are missing.

In Jintian Village and Caotan Village, the search and rescue team relied on the signal left by the last phone call of the missing person, combined with the identification of the villagers, to confirm the five search and rescue points. In order to reach the location of the missing personnel as soon as possible, the search and rescue team laid a floating plate one by one, and went deep into the silt; A number of excavators worked closely together to carry out rescue work. "The villagers were watching us. Our greatest wish is to find the missing persons as soon as possible." Said Wang Lv, a member of the Qinghai mobile team of the State Fire and Rescue Administration who participated in the search and rescue in Jintian village.

Multiple excavators are working at the rescue site.

The walls were blown down and the dust obscured the view

Mud water rushed up to the villagers in an instant

Minhe County, Haidong, Qinghai Province borders Jishishan County, Gansu Province. Jintian Village is located in the south of Minhe County, close to the epicenter of the Jishishan County Liugou village.

After the earthquake, Jintian villager Yang and his wife, more than 6 years old daughter, father, mother, 82-year-old grandmother, a temporary relative a total of 7 people ran to the yard for safety.

Suddenly, Mr. Yang heard the tree fall, the wall in the yard also fell, and the huge dust covered his sight. As the dust cleared, Mr. Yang saw that a large amount of muddy water had surged in front of him. Mr. Yang thought there was another earthquake and shouted "Run!" Picking up his daughter and running out, Mr. Yang's father also ran out.

Running to the street, Mr. Yang put his daughter down and hurried back to stand on a house near his home, looking for his lost family. He saw muddy water pouring into his house. He called out the names of his family, but no one was there.

The door of Mr. Yang's house was about to be blocked by sand, so he had to leave and return to the street. Mr. Yang's brother-in-law arrived in his car. Mr. Yang gave the child to his brother-in-law and asked him to take the child to a safe place.

A group of young and middle-aged villagers came to rescue the buried people. But they soon found that the mud buried in the house was soft and slippery, and it was difficult to pull out the feet, and it was difficult to move an inch, so they had to wait for professional rescue workers to arrive as soon as possible.

About an hour later, Mr. Yang returned to the house and saw that firefighters had arrived at the scene. Mr. Yang's house has two floors, and the first floor is completely submerged by mud. Mr. Yang saw that firefighters found boards and canvas, spread on the sand one by one, in order to allow rescuers to enter the depth of the sand to rescue. Villagers entered along the passageway set up by rescue workers and pointed out the approximate location of their buried relatives.

Mr. Yang learned that that night, the house of the second uncle was completely engulfed by sand, and a couple and two young children all lost contact.

The gully was filled with sediment and trees collapsed along its banks

Villagers volunteered to help with the rescue

After the earthquake, Minhe County Zhongchuan Township Jintian village and Caotan village occurred local "sand swell". As of 20:56 on December 20, the earthquake has killed 22 people in Haidong City, 198 people were injured, and 12 people are missing.

On the afternoon of December 19, cadres of Caotan Village in Zhongchuan Township of Minhe County told Red Star News reporters that there were still 7 people missing in the village, including 3 elderly people over 75 years old, 2 people over 40 years old, 2 people over 50 years old, and the local search and rescue organization.

On the afternoon of December 19, Wu Fenmei, a village cadre in Jintian Village, told reporters that 13 people lost contact in Jintian village, 5 people lost contact in one household, and 4 people lost contact in the other two households. Wu Fenmei introduced that Jintian village has a total of 1836 people and 414 households.

Jintian Village and Caotan Village are adjacent, and the two villages are bounded by a small river ditch used for irrigation. The second day of the earthquake, the villagers along the river gully to see that the sediment from a nearby not high "small dirt" landslide, along the small river gully flowing down, near the border of the two villages, the river gully narrowed, sediment encountered obstruction to Jintian village, Caotan village gushed, engulfed the villagers on both sides of the river gully homes.

Mud poured down the gully to the two neighbouring villages.

On December 20, many trees could be seen collapsed along the banks of the river gully after the sediment rush. More than ten meters deep, the river is filled with sediment, and the water on the surface of the sediment has frozen.

Relatives of the missing waited near the search site for news of their loved ones. Rescue workers set up tents for them to shelter from the cold and rest. From time to time, cries of sadness came from the tent. Mr. Yang's family lives there, too.

When the earthquake struck, Mr. Yang's 15-year-old eldest daughter, Xiao Yang, was in the county school, evacuating with her classmates. At noon on the 19th, Xiao Yang made a phone call to his grandfather and learned that his home was buried. Xiao Yang heart worried, immediately asked for leave to go home.

Arriving near his home, Xiao Yang saw a group of people gathered there. Xiao Yang found his father and saw that his father was crying. Xiao Yang does not believe that the buried family members are dead, she thinks, they are just trapped, temporarily missing.

On the evening of December 19, all four people buried in Mr. Yang's home were found and subsequently confirmed dead. Xiao Yang heard the family began to discuss the matter of buying a coffin, only to realize that their mother was really killed.

Next to the tents of the families, many Jintian villagers spontaneously came to the rescue as much as they could. Villagers Ms. Han and several women together, set up a pot, the freshly fried steaming cakes to rescue workers and villagers affected by the disaster. When the earthquake struck, Ms. Han and her family all ran to the village square to escape the sand brought by the "sand surge".

When the terrible noise calmed down, Ms. Han returned to the house near the house, saw that the home that had lived was buried under the sand, the door was blocked by the mud, and heard that several families were buried, "the heart is particularly uncomfortable." Afraid to go home, Ms. Han and her family moved in with relatives who were not affected by the disaster, "seven or eight people crowded into one bed, or slept in the car."

Last call to help locate the rescue site

Rescuers are racing against time against mud and freezing temperatures

After the earthquake, the Qinghai motor team of the State Fire and Rescue Administration (hereinafter referred to as the Qinghai Motor Team) rushed to the scene of the earthquake as soon as possible. At around 3 am on December 19, 200 trained members of the Qinghai Mobile Team arrived in Jintian Village to carry out search and rescue work. On the afternoon of December 20, Wang Lv, a mobile member of Qinghai, told the Red Star news reporter about the rescue situation at the scene.

Wang Lu told reporters that after arriving at the scene, the team realized that there was not only an earthquake in the local area, but also a secondary disaster. The sediment deposited at the site is about 4 meters thick. Low-slung bungalows were completely submerged, while the first floor of a two-story house was submerged, leaving only the second floor above the surface. The situation is complex and requires the deployment of large machinery and equipment.

The soft, wet mud made it difficult to move. In order to get to the area where the missing personnel are located, the team members found wooden boards, sacks, and laid a rescue channel piece by piece. The laying began around 4 a.m. and didn't finish until noon the next day. In order to race against time for search and rescue, the team carried out excavation work with iron mountain ash that night. Artificial excavation difficulties, Wang Lu and his teammates did not sleep a day and a night. 150 team members in groups of 20 people, take turns to enter the search and rescue site operations. The remaining 50 or so crew members are responsible for the support work to ensure that the rescue team is self-sufficient in the disaster area.

On the morning of December 19, excavators and other large machines entered, and the search and rescue efficiency was significantly improved. The search and rescue adopts the way of "man-machine cooperation", the excavator rummaging in the mud, once the missing person is found, the team will immediately come forward to carry out rescue work. 150 team members no longer shift, all on duty, always keep an eye on the scene rescue situation.

Silt washed away buildings and covered the ground. The mud is too thick for life detectors or radar to find the missing. So, how can rescue workers determine the location of the missing person?

Wang Lu told reporters that about 10 minutes after the earthquake, mud poured into the village. During the 10-minute gap, some of the missing villagers made one last call to their families to say they were safe. According to the positioning left by the call signal, the search and rescue team set up five search and rescue points, coupled with the identification of the villagers, targeted, accurate rescue. Among them, No. 1, No. 2 and No. 4 are located in Jintian Village, and No. 3 and No. 5 are located in Caotan Village.

"However, we can't rule out the possibility that the impact of the sand was so strong that it sent people 100 meters downstream." Wang Lu said.

Wang Lu introduced that the Qinghai mobile team is mainly responsible for the search and rescue work of the No. 1 and No. 2 points. With the bodies of the four victims found, the main search and rescue work at Point 1, the home of Mr. Yang, has almost been completed.

At point 2, a yellow house with only the second floor above the surface.

At point 2, the second floor of a yellow two-story house is exposed, the first floor submerged in mud. The walls of the second floor were covered with mud about 1 meter high, and mud poured into the room from the open door. Two bedding beds were floating on the mud near the house. Nearby, a few logs rose from the mud, the beams of an old flat house. As of the afternoon of December 20, under the sand, four villagers were buried and lost contact.

Among the four missing persons, an elderly woman is nearly 100 years old. The two-story yellow house is a newly built house, and the old lady usually lives in the flat old house next door. When the earthquake just happened, some family members and the old lady telephoned to say hello. However, 10 minutes later, the family lost contact with the woman. The new house is a frame structure, more stable, while the old house was completely destroyed by mud. As rescuers dug through the site of the old house, they saw broken beams and scattered wardrobes. On the 20th, the family members of the elderly entered the second floor through the channel built by rescue workers to take out some of the elderly's belongings.

Point 4 is a one-story house, most of which is buried, with only one roof exposed. There's a family of five missing inside.

Wang Lv told reporters that as of December 20, the No. 2 point has been equipped with four excavators, and the No. 4 point has about six excavators. The house at point 2 faces the house at point 4. The excavator starts from point 2 and point 4 respectively and digs to the center, cooperating with each other to cut through the two points and dig out a passable search and rescue channel.

Soft and slippery mud, coupled with cold weather at night in winter, is the biggest challenge for rescue efforts. "First, the silt is large, deep, contains more water, is soft and slippery, and is easy to collapse. Some excavator gears have all sunk into the mud, and the digging shovel needs to be stretched forward, pulling the fuselage forward with difficulty. Second, the weather is cold, with the lowest temperature reaching 16 degrees below zero. The rescuers need to endure the cold as they work."

In the morning, about 5 centimeters of ice will form on the surface of the mud, and the surface of the mud will become hard, and people can walk directly on it. But as temperatures rise, the ice melts, and people move around, the mud will become soft again, and one will step into the mud, and it will take a lot of strength to pull out the foot.

Despite the difficulties, the team will not waver in their determination to search. "The villagers were watching us. Our biggest wish is to find the missing as soon as possible, which is what we should do, "Wang said.