Thousands dead in India; quake toll rapidly rising

In this story: Coastal resort hardest hit India to treat calamity on 'war footing' Offers of help, aid RELATED STORIES, SITES

AHMEDABAD, India -- Funeral pyres lit the night sky Saturday in western India's devastated Gujarat state, where grief-stricken survivors of a massive earthquake waited for supplies and officials said the rapidly rising death toll could reach 15,000.

Heavy cranes moved concrete and steel, while relatives and friends frantically dug through the crumbled mess with bare hands, searching for anyone who might still be alive.

Gujarati official P.K. Lahiri said rescuers had pulled more than 3,200 bodies from the dusty rubble of towns and villages shattered by Friday's 7.9 magnitude earthquake, the worst to hit India in more than 50 years.

But with thousands still missing and time chipping away at any hope for finding more survivors, Indian Defense Secretary George Fernandes returned from a tour of a hard-hit town near the epicenter of the quake saying that the death toll could reach 15,000.

MAGNITUDE GUIDE Below is an interactive guide to earthquake magnitude and severity: Magnitude: Less than 3.5 3.5 - 5.4 Under 6.0 6.1 - 6.9 7.0 - 7.9 8 or greater    ALSO Aid officials assess quake damage

Coastal resort hardest hit

The quake toppled buildings in towns and cities at 8:46 a.m. on Friday across Gujarat, a prosperous industrial and agricultural state on India's west coast.

The tremor shook high-rise towers 966 kilometers (600 miles) away in the capital, New Delhi. The quake could be felt as far as 1,931 kilometers (1,200 miles) away in Calcutta and coastal Bangladesh.

Worst hit was Bhuj, a coastal resort near the Pakistan border, about 20 kilometers (14 miles) from the epicenter. The quake destroyed 90 percent of the homes in Bhuj, several schools and flattened the hospital, according to Fernandes.

"We have set up an emergency hospital and we are doing our best to treat the patients. More aid will arrive tomorrow," an official in Bhuj said.

Fifty homes were destroyed in Ahmedabad, Gujarat's commercial center.

Across the state, survivors camped outside overnight, afraid to be inside in case of more collapses.

About 30,000 were injured, according to the state's home minister, Haren Pandya. Medical teams have been sent to the worst affected areas and authorities were arranging for supplies of flour, milk powder, diesel, petrol and kerosene and water tankers, he said.

India to treat calamity on 'war footing'

Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, said Indian officials would treat the emergency with the seriousness of a war.

"The earthquake is a calamity of national magnitude," said Vajpayee, who planned a trip to the area to survey damage. "We have decided to meet the emergency on a war footing. This is the time for people to rally around."

In Ahmedabad, helmeted rescue workers used iron rods to pry slabs of concrete and metal, searching for survivors. Women wept and rocked back and forth, watching as the few available bulldozers and cranes pushed through the piles of stone that once had housed families and shops.

Beds, children's toys and clothes lay abandoned in the debris, lamp posts and electric pylons were twisted and many buildings were left leaning precariously.

Corpses were piled up on the verandah of the N.S. Hospital, while patients overflowing into the hallways wailed and screamed with broken limbs and bleeding wounds. Press Trust of India reported 70 people died awaiting treatment.

Bruised and bleeding bodies were laid in rows, covered with blankets as relatives sat by mourning.

Offers of help, aid

The Indian government said it was flying 10,000 tents, 10,000 tons of grain, 20 doctors and surgeons, communications and seismology experts to Gujarat. Mobile Red Cross hospitals in Finland and Germany were being readied.

Britain pledged $4.4 million and a search and rescue team of 60 was on standby to fly out. U.S. President George Bush said the United States is willing to provide assistance, and the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance announced that it will send a five-member earthquake assessment team to India on Sunday.

People in the quake zone were using CNN's online message boards to ask about relatives and relay their experiences. Helplines were also kept busy.

The quake was the most powerful to strike India since August 15, 1950, when an 8.5 magnitude temblor killed 1,538 people in northeastern Assam state.

The last major quake to hit the Gujarat area was in 1819, when a quake estimated at an 8.3 magnitude killed about 2,500 people.

It was the world's second major quake of the year. On January 13, a quake measuring 7.6 killed at least 700 people in El Salvador and left 10 percent of its population homeless.

CNN New Delhi Bureau Chief Satinder Bindra and Producer Suhasini Haider, The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

More than 1,000 dead in India earthquake
January 26, 2001

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