Satinder Bindra: Quake damage widespread


Bindra

CNN's Satinder Bindra is in Ahmedabad, India, scene of massive destruction from Friday's massive earthquake.

Q: What is it like where the quake struck?

Bindra: What I've seen is a city that's been destroyed, literally, in some parts. Some 50 high rises in the city are down; roads have huge cracks in them; people are sleeping outside, huddled around fires or beneath blankets, fearing aftershocks.

You see floodlights everywhere. Rescue workers, including army men, are working with everything they've got, even with their bare hands, digging away furiously for hours and hours because they know time is of the essence. They know its been 24 hours since the quake hit, and if they can't get these people out real fast then perhaps its too late.

There's also a lot of anger in the city. Residents are angry because they feel the government hasn't done enough. The prime minister says relief efforts will go on a war footing, but people here say they haven't seen that. They say the need of the hour is some cranes. They say they need tents, backhoes, they need tools, they need medicines. So until that comes this anger is not likely to die down.

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Q: Where is the worst damage?

Bindra: I am in the city of Ahmedabad; just west of here is the city of Bhuj. I haven't been there, but the reports we're getting from there seem to indicate that the damage is even more extensive, because that was the center of the quake. Some 90 percent of the homes, the buildings and the houses there are destroyed, and the casualty count is, perhaps, a lot higher. We're hearing reports that it may have crossed a thousand in Bhuj alone.

I must describe to you, by the way, one of the most touching, most emotive scenes here. About 70 students at a school, the Sacred Flower school, a high school, are trapped inside what remained of their school building. Earlier there were hopes that rescue workers could pull them out alive, but just about an hour or so ago, senior army officers told me that they perhaps wouldn't be able to do so. They didn't think there was much hope for those left inside. In the last several hours they've pulled out 24 or 25 dead bodies, and only four or five survivors. They've also not heard any yells, any screams, any moans from inside, and when army officers peered inside, they found most of the students had been trapped inside in a stairwell and all they could see was mangled bodies and arms and legs.

Outside, where the parents have been waiting for hours and hours, it's a very, very emotive scene. One mother told me, "I know it. I know it. I'm confident. This is my only son. This is my only son," she kept telling me. "He will walk out."

But other residents are saying it's been far too long that they've been trapped, and again, a mood of anger, mixed with a lot of emotion from the parents, who are still trying to be optimistic.

But when I talked to them, they knew it was now going to be very, very tough to find their kids.