Afghan quake survivors dig graves with pickaxes as entire households wiped out
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Volunteers digging graves for people who died during a deadly Aug 31 earthquake, in Afghanistan's Kunar province, on Sept 1.
PHOTO: AFP
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- A magnitude 6 earthquake in Afghanistan's Kunar province flattened villages, causing over 600 deaths, according to officials on Sept 2.
- Survivors like Mrs Gul Bibi lost entire families, stating "I lost everything," while others manually retrieved bodies from collapsed homes.
- Rescue teams evacuated 420 victims, but the UN warned the death toll would rise as people remained trapped and aftershocks persisted.
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KABUL/MAZAR DARA, Afghanistan - Mr Nasrullah Khan's voice breaks as he describes how with his own hands he buried three children in one grave and two young men in another after an earthquake struck the mountainous southeastern Afghan province of Kunar on Aug 31.
Mr Nasrullah, an office worker from Kunar City, travelled six hours into Dewagul Valley in Kunar after the quake to help rescue efforts.
“The first man I met had lost 18 members of his family,” he said. “The injured and the dead were lying on the ground with no aid. In some villages, only two or three people survived in each household. It was the first time in my life I saw so many dead bodies.”
“Entire households were gone.”
In valleys lined with mud-brick homes, survivors carried bodies on woven stretchers. Mr Nasrullah said he saw the bodies of children wrapped in patterned blankets and men digging graves with pickaxes.
The Aug 31 6-magnitude quake
On Sept 2, a second large quake
Officials said three villages in Kunar were flattened, causing more than 600 deaths. The Defence Ministry said 40 flights had evacuated 420 victims as rescue teams moved from badly hit villages to more remote hamlets.
Mrs Gul Bibi, an 80-year-old, was weeping, holding a toddler in her arms, next to a destroyed house in the mountain village of Mazar Dara, one of the places worst hit in Kunar province.
“I lost everything,” Bibi said, saying her family was buried under the mud and debris of their home. “Just this grandson survived.”
The United Nations has warned the toll would rise as victims remained trapped under the rubble.
In Dara-e-Noor, in the province of Nangarhar, 23-year-old Ziarat Gul said his uncle’s house collapsed, killing a seven-year-old boy and two girls.
“We pulled them out with our hands, but they were already gone.”
Livestock sheltering inside a house damaged by the quake, in Afghanistan’s Kunar province, on Sept 2.
PHOTO: REUTERS
He and his family have been sleeping in open fields since the quake.
Mr Nasrullah said he went to three villages and helped bury 41 bodies, but not all could be laid to rest.
“We buried people quickly, before aftershocks forced us to run from the grave sites,” he said. REUTERS
