Bangladesh: Rana Plaza death toll reaches 772

The death toll from the country’s worst-ever industrial accident reached 772 as 12 more bodies were pulled from the rubble Wednesday.

Fifteen days into the terrible collapse of the eight-story Rana Plaza in Savar, rescuers are finding more bodies, most of them badly decomposed.

“Almost all of the bodies being pulled from the rubble are disfigured,” said Kamrul Hasan, Upazila Nirbahi Officer of Savar. “The stench of rotten bodies is growing,” he said.

Rescuers discovered 44 more bodies yesterday, according to information from the Inter Service Public Relations (ISPR) control room at 9pm.

Since the exact number of people inside Rana Plaza at the time of the collapse was unknown, no one has been able to say how many more bodies should be found.

With Tuesday’s recovery, the number of people rescued dead and alive so far stands at 3,152, including the 2,437 people rescued alive.

Rescuers expect more bodies from the rubble as many are still reported missing. A large number of people continue to wait near the site of the collapse for the news of missing relatives. Their gathering point is a school playing field where bodies retrieved from the ruins are taken for initial identification attempts.

The task of identification is made more difficult by the decomposed state of many of the bodies. The recovery effort is expected to continue for several more days, according to rescuers.

Authorities have so far handed over 560 bodies to relatives of the victims while 63 bodies remain at Adhar Chandra High School playground awaiting identification and 47 bodies have been taken to different hospital morgues.

A total of 34 unclaimed bodies that had not been identified because of bad decomposition were buried at the Jurain graveyard in the capital.

Meanwhile hundreds of garment workers who survived the April 24 collapse of Rana Plaza blocked a major highway near the accident site to demand wages and other benefits. No violence was reported, although traffic was disrupted for hours.

The agitated workers withdrew the blockade at noon after officials of the district administration assured them of taking steps in this regard.

Rana Plaza, which housed several garment factories, collapsed on April 24 after owners forced several thousand workers to work there even after cracks had developed on some pillars and floors of the building the day before.

Wednesday 8 May 2013

http://dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2013/may/08/rana-plaza-death-toll-reaches-734