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China quake toll soars above 20,000

DUJIANGYAN, China, May 14 (AFP):

The full horror of the devastating China earthquake began to emerge Wednesday as rescuers discovered whole towns all but wiped off the map, pushing the death toll well above 20,000. Military and police teams punched into the heart of the disaster zone, with 100 troops parachuting into a county that was previously cut off while planes and helicopters air-dropped emergency supplies. “Some towns basically have no houses left. They have all been razed to the ground,” Wang Yi, who heads an armed police unit sent into the epicentre zone, was quoted as saying by Sichuan Online news site. At least 7,700 people died in Yingxiu town alone, Xinhua news agency cited a local government official as saying, with only 2,300 surviving. Across Sichuan, thousands are missing or buried under the rubble of shattered homes, schools and factories. The air drop started with planes and helicopters flying dozens of sorties, dropping tonnes of food and relief aid into the worst-hit zone, most of it cut off from the outside world by landslides and road closures. The destruction around the epicentre in remote Wenchuan county was massive, with whole mountainsides sheared off, highways ripped apart and building after building levelled. CCTV television said air drops were also made in nearby Mianyang - where the death toll jumped to nearly 5,500 - as well as Mianzhu and Pengzhou. The local disaster relief headquarters said rescuers had been able to pull 500 people alive out of the debris of collapsed buildings, but 20,000 in three outer villages were still out of reach.