For more than 24 hours, Alessandro Dalvit and his dog Muttley scampered over piles of rubble in three towns, including this one, where more than 190 people perished in a devastating quake that struck central Italy on Wednesday. The tremors were felt as far as 100 miles away in Rome.
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The worst affected towns – Amatrice, Arquata, Accumoli and Pescara del Tronto – are usually sparsely populated but have been swelled by tourists visiting for summer, making estimates for the precise number missing hard.
“Now that daylight has come, we see that the situation is even more awful than we feared with buildings collapsed, people trapped under the rubble and no sound of life”, Pertucci, Accumoli mayor, told RAI-TV.
Amatrice’s mayor had initially said 70 guests were in the crumbled hotel ahead of this weekend’s festival, but rescue workers later halved that estimate and the owner said most guests had managed to escape.
In Rome, Immacolata Postiglione, head of the emergency unit at the Civil Protection Department, said that 215 people had been rescued from the wreckage of the natural disaster. “A collapsed bridge? We cross the river” – as long as it’s not too deep.
An Associated Press report was included in this story.
“In most cases, unfortunately, the only thing they’re able to retrieve is their bodies and that’s one of the reasons why we’ve seen the death toll rise so much overnight”. Media outlets are reporting conflicting numbers.
The fact that the devastation comes just seven years after more than 300 died in the nearby town of L’Aquila has prompted concerns not enough is being done to protect people’s property and lives.
“Four people are under the rubble, but they are not showing any sign of life”.
The most deadly natural disaster since the 20th century struck in 1908, when a quake followed by a tsunami killed about 80,000 people in Reggio Calabria and Sicily.
The residents of the mountainous region that was severely damaged by the natural disaster were asked to provide open internet access in order to assist the communication of rescue forces, who continue to search for survivors underneath the ruins.
As the search effort continued, the soul-searching began as Italy once again confronted the responsibilities that come with having the highest seismic hazard in Western Europe. The U.S. Geological Survey put the magnitude at 6.2, while Italy’s geological observatory measured it at magnitude 6.0. “It seemed the bed was walking across the room by itself with us on it”, Lina Mercantini of Ceselli, Umbria, told Reuters.
Mayor Nicola Alemanno said no deaths have been reported deaths in Norcia.
Prime Minister Matteo Renzi’s office said rescue teams were being sent to the worst-hit areas.
Olga Urbani, in the nearby town of Scheggino, said: “Dear God it was very bad”.
Houses have been cleaved in two, offering glimpses into the intimacy of people’s lives – shelves full of books, cupboards containing clothes, and dust-covered kitchens.
Television stations showed images of rubble-strewn streets in a number of towns.
RAI-TV reported that an investigation has been opened in Rieti into possible culpable negligence that may have led to the collapse of a school in Amatrice and a bell tower in Accumoli, which have been restored recently.
Residents of Rome, some 170 kilometres (105 miles) from the epicentre, were woken by the quake, which rattled furniture and swayed lights in most of central Italy.
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“I was extremely saddened to see the tragic loss of life following the devastating quake in central Italy, which now includes the death of a Canadian citizen, Foreign Affairs Minister Stéphane Dion said in a statement”.
