As Authorities Struggle to Help Indonesian Quake Victims, Neighbors Fill the Void - NYTimes.com

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By PETER GELLING and NORIMITSU ONISHI

PADANG, Indonesia — Emergency workers continued to struggle Sunday to reach several remote villages buried beneath landslides caused by a large earthquake, while a steady stream of bodies, wrapped in yellow bags, arrived by ambulance at Padang’s main hospital.

More than 700 people were confirmed dead throughout the island of Sumatra, and thousands remained missing four days after a 7.6-magnitude earthquake hit the western coast. Heavy rains at night hampered rescue efforts.

In the heart of Padang, with little or sometimes no help coming from the authorities, some affected neighborhoods turned to an informal network of businesses and volunteers to fill the void.

On one block in the city’s Chinese quarter, workers at a coal concern and a truck rental company set up a base from which they dispatched much-needed earth-moving vehicles across the city. The two companies responded to private requests, usually from friends and business partners, said Budianto, 38, who supervises shipping at the coal company, Bumi Anyer Wisesa, and had no experience dealing with rescue missions.

Aside from one soldier who stood guard on a side street where a tractor had started to clear rubble on Sunday morning, officials had yet to reach the neighborhood.

“There’s no coordination with the government at all,” Mr. Budianto said.

A colleague was driving around the city, trying to assess the requests streaming in, but Mr. Budianto was unable to reach him because of erratic cellphone service.

“It’s difficult because there’s no clear command,” he said. “Sometimes someone in a damaged house will come and plead with our truck operators for help.”

Not far away, a group of church volunteers had been treating about 350 patients a day, mostly for less serious injuries. A Malaysian aid truck, apparently noticing the sign outside the volunteers’ temporary facilities, stopped by with some medical supplies. It was the first time the church volunteers had received outside assistance, said Sam Soh, who was coordinating the group’s efforts.

“We are running out of food and medication,” Mr. Soh said. “We can’t give people less than five days of antibiotics for the medication to be effective.”

Doctors said the possibility of finding survivors was increasingly slim with each passing day. The main hospital appeared eerily quiet over the weekend.

“Very few living patients have arrived at the hospital over the weekend,” said Idrus Patarussi, an official from the Indonesian Health Ministry. “The likelihood of finding any more survivors, in fact, is small.”

Emergency officials, however, remained hopeful.

“This is still a rescue mission, not a recovery mission,” said Winston Chang, chief of the United Nations’ office for disaster assessment and coordination.

Anxious family members trying to find their loved ones gathered outside the hospital’s morgue to check lists of names and photographs. Doctors said that most of the bodies that had arrived so far had been identified and taken away by relatives.

“I am here to pick up my husband’s body,” said Titi Relawati, 45, who sobbed at the sight of her husband’s photograph. Rescue workers found her husband buried inside the Ambacang Hotel, the site of the city’s largest rescue effort. Scores are believed to have been buried when the seven-story hotel collapsed.

The authorities said that they had prepared a mass grave in a field just outside the city, but that so far it had not been used. Several mosques were said to be holding collective burial ceremonies at local cemeteries.

As hopes of finding survivors have faded, some have grown angry at the slow pace of rescue efforts, especially residents from more remote villages outside the city.

“There are no medical supplies, no food, no drinks, no aid groups, no government officials — nothing,” Buyung, a 33-year-old standing over his unconscious mother at the hospital in Padang, said about his home village of Tandikek, most of which lies buried beneath a landslide.

Several of Mr. Buyung’s family members managed to evacuate his mother, Saryani, 60, after a concrete slab struck her head. They carried her down a rural, dust-covered road until a passing car picked them up and took them nearly 50 miles to the hospital.

Mr. Chang, the United Nations coordinator, said rescue teams from Australia, Turkey and South Korea had gone north to Padang Pariaman, the rural district where Mr. Buyung’s village is located, on Sunday morning.

The teams were planning to head into the district’s remote areas, where entire villages have been buried, Mr. Chang said.

Indonesian troops who arrived in those areas on Saturday morning were hobbled by a lack of equipment and coordination, angering residents who had been waiting for help since the quake hit Wednesday evening.

Hundreds of people caught in the landslides there were still missing, and few survivors expected to find loved ones alive.

Indonesia quake kills 75, thousands trapped - Houston Chronicle

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By NINIEK KARMINI Associated Press Writer

JAKARTA, Indonesia — A powerful earthquake rocked western Indonesia Wednesday, trapping thousands under collapsed buildings — including two hospitals — and triggering landslides. At least 75 people were killed on Sumatra island and the death toll was expected to climb sharply.

The magnitude 7.6 quake struck at 5:15 p.m. local time (1015GMT, 6:15 a.m. EDT), just off the coast of Padang city the U.S. Geological Survey said. It was along the same fault line that spawned the massive 2004 Asian tsunami that killed more than 230,000 people in a dozen countries.

A tsunami warning for countries along the Indian Ocean was issued, and panicked residents fled to higher ground fearing giant waves. The warning was lifted about an hour later.

When the quake struck, the ground was shaking so hard that people sat down on the streets to avoid falling over, footage shot in Padang and broadcast by local TVOne network showed.

Children screamed as residents tried to put out fires started in the quake. Thousands fled the coast in cars and motorbikes, honking horns.

Initial reports received by the government said 75 people were killed, but the real number is "definitely higher than that," Vice President Jusuf Kalla told reporters in the capital, Jakarta.

"It's hard to tell because there is heavy rain and a blackout," he said.

Health Minister Siti Fadilah Supari told MetroTV that a mall and two hospitals had collapsed in Padang — a sprawling low-lying city in Western Sumatra province of around 900,000 people that geologists have warned could be vulnerable to a massive quake or tsunami.

"This is a high-scale disaster, more powerful than the earthquake in Yogyakarta in 2006 when more than 3,000 people died," Supari said, referring to a major city on the main island of Java.

Rustam Pakaya, head of the Health Ministry's crisis center, said "thousands of people are trapped under the collapsed houses."

A field hospital was being prepared to assist the injured and medical teams were on the way from neighboring provinces, he said.

"Many buildings are badly damaged, including hotels and mosques," said Wandono, an official at Meteorology and Geophysics Agency in Jakarta, citing reports from residents.

Footage from Padang showed flattened buildings, the foot of one person sticking out from beneath the debris.

"The earthquake was very strong," said Kasmiati, who lives on the coast near to the epicenter. "People ran to high ground. Houses and buildings were badly damaged."

"I was outside, so I am safe, but my children at home were injured," she said before her cell phone went dead.

TV One said the quake triggered landslides that cut all roads to Padang. Power and telecommunications were also cut. Fire also broke out in buildings on a road to the city, officials said.

"I want to know what happened to my sister and her husband," said Fitra Jaya, who owns a house in downtown Padang and was in Jakarta when the quake struck. "I tried to call my family there, but I could not reach anyone at all."

Wednesday's quake came a day after a quake with a magnitude of between 8.0 and 8.3 in the South Pacific hurled a massive tsunami at the shores of Samoa and American Samoa, flattening villages and leaving at least 99 dead and dozens missing.

The epicenter of Wednesday's temblor off Indonesia lies several thousand miles (kilometers) to the west, on the other side of Australia.

The shaking could be felt in high buildings in Jakarta, several hundred miles (kilometers) away. It was also felt in neighboring Singapore and Malaysia.

Padang was badly hit by an 8.4 magnitude quake in September 2007, when dozens of people died and several large buildings collapsed.

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AP reporters Ali Kotarumalos, Irwan Firdaus contributed to this article.