Death toll in Goa building collapse climbs to 27

wo more bodies were pulled out today from the debris of the Canacona building collapse here, taking the death toll in the accident to 27.

Bodies of two men were extricated from the rubble this morning as rescue operations entered the seventh day, Director of Fire and Emergency Services Ashok Menon told PTI.

The five-storey building at Canacona town, 70 km from here, had caved in last Saturday.

The rescuers had began clearing the debris little after the tragedy but met with a roadblock on Monday when they had to withdraw operations due to threat to adjacent buildings following which manual rescue work began on Tuesday. Sixteen people were thereafter pulled alive out of the wreckage.

The search and clean-up operations at the disaster site at Chaudi, Canacona entered the seventh day on Friday, even as the demolition machine continued its operations for the second day, though no more bodies were recovered.

Speaking to TOI, South Goa collector Venancio Furtado said that a part of the row house that was hampering the movement of the demolition machine was razed in the evening. "This was done to facilitate access to the machine to the portion of the debris of the collapsed building where more bodies may be lying. There is a stench emanating from that portion and it is expected that some bodies could be traced there. There was no other way for the machine to gain access to that spot and the structure was already declared unsafe," Furtado said.

The decision to bring down the part of the row house was taken after chief minister Manohar Parrikar visited the site in the evening and took stock of the situation. Parrikar said that it may take another 3-4 days for the debris to be cleared. There could be six more bodies still underneath the rubble, he added.

The chief minister had earlier said that while the structure located towards the lower end of the debris (referring to the row house) will be demolished, a decision with regards to the other structures was yet to be taken.

Saturday 11 January 2014

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/goa/part-of-row-house-demolished-to-ease-search-operations/articleshow/28653006.cms

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/death-toll-in-goa-building-collapse-climbs-to-27/article5565857.ece

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Bones and skulls still being found in Rana Plaza debris

Some form of closure has finally arrived for the family of Obaidul Haque, who had been missing since the deadly Rana Plaza disaster, after the garment worker’s skeletal remains were recently recovered from under the debris of the building.

Obaidul, who worked at the New Wave Bottoms factory and hailed from Mymensingh, was the first among the missing workers whose full skeleton had been found since the rescue operation was called off.

Although eight and a half months had passed since the tragedy occurred, human bones and skulls are still being found at the Rana Plaza site, as relatives of many missing people continue their wait to be able to bury their loved ones.

The long wait for Obaidul’s family ended when his skeleton was found along with an identity card and a mobile phone, during a series of search drives.

Locals said the first human skull was recovered on December 13 last year by street children, who were trying to collect iron rods and pieces from the debris.

Following the incident, garment workers, street children and voluntary organisations conducted more drives and found at least 310 pieces of human skeletal remains, including four skulls from the debris, said Emdadul Islam, president of Rana Plaza Garments Workers Union.

He added that street children carried out searches on four occasions at the site, while other organisations carried out five drives.

The highest number of bones recovered during a single drive was 110 different skeletal pieces from eight separate places at the Rana Plaza site, Emdadul said.

“On our last drive on January 3, we recovered 28 pieces of human bones including a skull from the debris. We wanted to continue the drives, but police barred us, saying the bones were cow bones and threatened us with arrest,” said Emdadul, who worked at Rana Plaza’s Phantom Garments as an iron man and was rescued after 24 hours of the deadly collapse.

The locals who were involved in the searches said they had seen many bone parts lying neglected in three water-reservoirs at the site.

“We just want to conduct a drive at the three places, and we are sure that we could recover some bodies of the unlucky workers from there,” said Emdadul.

Labour rights leaders also urged authorities concerned to launch renewed search efforts, saying it was now clear that not all bodies had been found during the initial rescue drive.

Rafiqul Islam Sujan, president of Bangladesh Garment and Industrial Workers Federation, told the Dhaka Tribune that another search in the debris was very much needed.

Labour leader Syed Sultan Uddin Ahmed, also the assistant executive director at Bangladesh Institute of Labour Studies, said: “A search is immediately needed and the government cannot neglect the issue now, just because it is no longer a burning issue.”

While visiting the site on Thursday afternoon, many relatives of the missing workers were found to be waiting there for updates about searches for their loved ones.

Shapla, who was injured in the Rana Plaza collapse, said her brother Solaimen Hossain Sentu – who also worked with her on the third floor of the building – remains missing since the incident.

“I provided DNA in Dhaka, but so far, none of the found bodies are my brother’s. So I come here often hoping one day, my brother’s body parts would be found,” she said.

When contacted, Savar model police station Officer-in-Charge Mostafa Kamal claimed that some people were staging a drama to embarrass the government, adding that the bones were not “human,” rather they were “cow bones” or had been collected from outside.

The bones have been sent to the National Forensic DNA Profiling Lab in Dhaka to verify the true identity of the bones, he added.

Savar Upazila Nirbahi Officer Kamrul Hasan Molla, who was now in charge of the debris site, admitted that he had received pieces of recovered human bodies and had already sent them to the DNA lab at Dhaka Medical Collage and Hospital.

“After getting results from the lab, we would have an indication that whether these bones belong to Rana Plaza workers or not; and then, we will decide whether it is necessary to run a fresh search,” he said.

Kamrul also said his office had already sent a report to the higher authority in this regard, but did not clarify who the higher authority was.

At least 1,134 people were killed and thousands more injured when the nine-storied Rana Plaza collapsed on April 24 last year.

The Ninth Infantry Division of army, which led the rescue, abandoned the search for survivors on May 13.

According to a statement issued by the Inter Services Public Relations Directorate, 261 people remained untraced at the site. The army identified those 261 out of 329 people who were reportedly missing after the collapse.

Saturday 11 January 2014

http://www.dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2014/jan/11/bones-and-skulls-still-being-found-rana-plaza-debris

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'People think you have a destiny': Sole survivors of plane crashes reveal how they struggle with guilt after walking away from accidents that killed hundreds

Only a handful of others have shared the same experiences as George Lamson Jr, who was the sole survivor of a Reno plane crash that killed everyone except him.

Lamson, who was 17 when the passenger jet he was on crashed, killing his father and 69 others in 1985, may have walked away with his life, but he has been haunted by survivor's guilt ever since.

And, with only 25 people alive today who have shared the same experience, Lamson has had trouble finding others who can understand how he is feeling.

'People look at you and think you have a destiny ... that's completely unrealistic,' he told CNN, saying he felt under pressure after the accident to do something with his life.

After nearly three decades of struggling to come to terms with his experience, Lamson has reached out to other sole survivors.

His journey has brought him in contact with Jim Polehinke, the co-pilot of a plane that crashed on take off in Lexington, Kentucky, in 2006; and 14-year-old Bahia Bakari who was found clinging to the wreckage when her plane went down off the coast of Comoros in 2009.

This small band of survivors recalled their accidents and struggle to come to term with events afterwards on CNN documentary Sole Survivor.

While Lamson says he was buoyed by the relief of walking away from a crash and the ensuing media circus that followed, when it ended he was left in a void.

'There's people in all walks of life who suffered loss like I have' Lamson said, but they were not in the limelight. 'When it stopped it left a vacuum. I'd eat a lot, sleep a lot, anything to stop thinking about it.'

It wasn't until the birth of his daughter, Hannah, that he finally felt his life had meaning.

Unlike Lamson who was the focus of intense media scrutiny, Cecelia Chichan, who was four when her whole family were wiped out in a 1987 crash in Detroit, was a teenager before her extended family fully explained what she had been through.

Her parents and brother were among the 154 people killed when the plane went down.

She became known as the 'miracle child' after she was dug out of the burning wreckage by a rescuer who heard her whimper.

Northwest Airlines flight 255 crashed shortly after take-off at an airport in Romulus, Michigan en route to Phoenix, Arizona on August 16, 1987.

It remains one of the deadliest air disasters in U.S. history.

Rescue workers had given up hope of finding anyone alive when they heard Cecelia moaning and trapped under her seat.

It was believed that Cecelia survived the crash because her mother shielded her with her own body. Her mother, Paula, father Michael and brother, David, six were among those killed as the family returned from their vacation.

The four-year-old suffered serious injuries including a fractured skull, broken leg and collarbone and third-degree burns. She underwent four skin grafts for the burns on her arms and legs.

'When I read about [other crashes] I feel inferior,' Cecelia, who has a tattoo of a plane on her wrist said. She has never attended the annual memorial to those who lost their lives, saying: 'I feel like I would get too much attention. I don't want to be in the spotlight.'

There was intense global interest in the little girl, which saw her feature on magazine covers and receive piles of gifts from strangers.

More than 2,000 presents and 30,000 cards were sent to the University of Michigan Medical Center but her guardians asked that they be distributed to local children's hospitals. The family also set up a trust fund after she received more than $150,000 in donations.

Her uncle Franklin Lumpkin and her aunt Rita, her mother's sister, kept her sheltered from the attention once she left hospital after seven weeks of treatment, allowing her to grow up in obscurity in Birmingham, Alabama.

Cecelia, who is now 31 and married, had never spoken publicly but has a small tattoo of an airplane on her left wrist to remind her of a tragedy that she thinks about 'every day'.

Lamson has also stayed away from memorials, saying he felt the relatives of victims would be angry at him for not doing more with his second chance at life.

'Survivor's guilt is a monster. Still not figured out how to absolve myself of that burden,' he told CNN

When he recently traveled to Normandy in France to meet fellow solo survivor Bahia, for the first time he was able to talk to someone who was going through the same emotions.

For Bahia, who after the crash was left clinging to wreckage in the sea for more than nine hours, meeting Lamson helped her open up about the depression she has suffered since.

'I am happy, I don't feel so alone anymore,' she said as the two compared notes on how they have coped with their experience.

Like Bahia, Lamson was a teenager at the time of the crash. He was on his school sports teams and had a promising future ahead in his home town in Minnesota.

On the night of the crash two other passengers on the plane had asked Lamson and his father to change seats just before take off. The family did and, when the plane went down, Lamson was thrown clear of the fiery crash.

Lamson: 'We started falling from the sky and the pilot told us we were going to crash.' He had just seconds to pull his legs up and cover his face before the plane went down.

For Polehinke, who was at the controls of the plane when it crashed on take off, the survivor's guilt is even more intense. He still feels responsible for all his passengers and crew. 'I would have rather died with everyone else,' Polehinke, who was left paralyzed, said.

He has kept cuttings of the pictures and profiles of those on board that day. 'I look at it, not to torture myself but to see what they had done,' he told CNN. 'I don't think there will ever be a time I can forgive myself.'

Each of the survivors are finding their own ways to cope, and nearly all still take flights, but the memories of what they have been through remains.

Friday 10 January 2014

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2536953/People-think-destiny-Sole-survivors-plane-crashes-reveal-struggle-guilt-walking-away-accidents-killed-hundreds.html

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Kegworth air disaster: Detective Inspector Kelvyn Ashby recounts the grim task of dealing with the fatalities

Detective Inspector Kelvyn Ashby had just got home after a busy 12-hour shift when he received a call from his detective sergeant.

“It was about 8.45pm, at first it was thought to be one of the routine exercises declared at the airport, but 10 minutes later he rang back to confirm a plane had gone down,” he said.

The 63-year-old, who retired as a detective chief superintendent, rang his then boss, Superintendent Graham Blandford, and they agreed to meet on the bridge over the motorway near the crash scene.

He said: “I wasn’t sure what we would do when we got there, but it soon became apparent there was no plan in place for dealing with bodies from where the plane had crashed.

“There was a plan for crashes at the airport, but not for one outside its perimeter.

“I said, ‘shall we go and find somewhere to use as a mortuary?’.

“We went to the airport and were directed to a barn-type building and opened it up. There were already bodies arriving. Thankfully, it was January and it was freezing.

“By now, it was about midnight. We had no template for this. We called in all detectives on duty. There were about 15 of us. Two officers were assigned to each body.

“We got out chalk used for road accidents to mark out where the bodies would go.”

Officers then painstakingly gathered together all the victims’ belongings and completed personal description forms noting identification marks such as tattoos and birthmarks.

Mr Ashby and his men took little break from their grim task over the next week, determined to return the victims’ bodies to their loved ones as soon as possible.

He said: “Three or four post-mortem examinations at a time were carried out. The priority was to get the bodies away.

“It was not a pleasant experience. Some of the bodies were mutilated, most involved broken bones and multiple internal injuries. Dealing with children was the worst.

“Over three or four days, people got to grips with what had happened. We were offered counselling, but what we did as a group was go to the pub – it was the best debrief we could have had.

“But it was too much for one officer, who left the force on ill health because he never recovered from the experience and was suffering post-traumatic stress disorder.”

Lessons learned at Kegworth were passed on to other forces.

Mr Ashby said: “One of the things which came out of the debriefs was what if this had happened in July? It happened in January when it was freezing, but we had to search for a cold store large enough to deal with a situation like this if, God forbid, it ever happens again.”

Friday 10 January 2014

http://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/Kegworth-air-disaster-Detective-Inspector-Kelvyn/story-20414499-detail/story.html

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Zimbabwe: Zim's first DNA testing centre registered

The country's first ever DNA testing centre has been registered with the Medical Laboratory and Clinic Scientists Council of Zimbabwe, bringing local solutions to paternity disputes and other civil and criminal challenges.

Although the African Institute of Biomedical Science and Technology (AIBST) is charging US$500 to conclude investigating a case, indications are that the charges will come down as more such facilities are opened.

DNA tests can be done to establish the child's biological parents in maintenance cases, to establish a rapist in criminal investigations, identify bodies of accident victims, in murder investigations, tracing the family histories in chieftainship wrangles, and many other uses.

Over the years, paternity cases were being referred to South African companies, but AIBST - based in Harare - acquired the requisite DNA equipment and got accreditation mid-last year.

AIBST conducted DNA tests to identify bodies of the victims of the Chisumbanje accident towards the end of 2013.

AIBST president and chief scientific officer Professor Collen Masimirembwa, said the development was a major milestone in the history and development of forensic science in Zimbabwe.

"In Zimbabwe, for a long time, forensic science had remained behind using traditional and manual means like taking finger prints and using the magnifying glass for identification purposes.

"For drug crimes, there were no machines. The police and health (officials) are also working towards buying the same machines that we use here and they have come several times to see how we operate.

"As AIBST, we have invigorated the country. We have acted as a catalyst to prove that Zimbabweans can do it.

"We have brought an evolutionary jump. Suddenly within less than a year, Zimbabwe can now conduct DNA tests putting us at the same level as other countries like South Africa," said Prof Masimirembwa.

Prof Masimirembwa said their organisation had worked with the Government on the Chisumbanje accident and they were ready to assist the police, courts, hospitals and other State institutions whenever necessary.

Several people were burnt beyond recognition when a Green Fuel tanker was involved in an accident with a Madza T35 light truck that was ferrying mourners in Chipinge last year.

The resultant fire from the ethanol tanker burnt dozens of people beyond recognition and there was fear that family and friends would not be able to give their loved ones proper burials as they could not identify their bodies. DNA samples were subsequently sent to AIBST.

Prof Masimirembwa said everything was done in Harare at the AIBST laboratory and no samples were sent out to other countries.

"We do everything from here from taking of samples to the presentation and announcement of results," he said.

AIBST started conducting paternity tests at the end of last year and it was mainly dealing with cases of individuals and families who wanted to ascertain the facts without the involvement of the courts.

"We are assisting individuals and families who make their own decisions to get tested for their own personal reasons but we are yet to get referrals from the courts.

"Maybe the courts are not aware that we are doing the same locally in order for them to refer cases to us," he said.

Paternity disputes have all along been referred to South African experts for DNA verification.

Friday 10 January 2014

http://allafrica.com/stories/201401100586.html

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India train fire:wait to identify four badly charred bodies

Agonising wait for the families of four passengers missing after Wednesday's fire on the Mumbai-Dehradun Express.

The already traumatised families of the four missing passengers of the Mumbai-Dehradun Express that caught fire on Wednesday have been told that it may take up to six weeks to establish the identities of the four bodies charred beyond recognition.

Nine people died in the fire that ripped through three bogies near Dahanu Road station, and the Western Railway (WR) officials were able to identify five of the deceased within a few hours of the accident.

The railway officials reported that around eight passengers had been missing, and at least 45 opted out when the train resumed the journey around six hours after the incident.

By Thursday afternoon, the WR officials were able to locate four of the eight people missing, and all 45 passengers who had opted out had also been contacted.

Four people, including two from Mumbai, are now on the final list of the passengers missing, and their relatives, who have been waiting at the J J Hospital where post-mortems had been conducted, are in for lengthy, agonizing wait.

The hospital dean, Dr T P Lahane, said: "The DNA samples have been sent to the Forensic Science Laboratory in Kalina. It may take up to six weeks for the results to arrive."

Two of the four still missing are from Mumbai -- Null Bazaar resident Sakina Arsiwala, 57, and Jamir Ahmed, 60, from Jogeshwari - while the other two are an Indorebased couple, Hakimuddin Rassiwala, 63, and Zaibun Rassiwala, 53.

The railway doesn't want to take any chances, considering the goof-up barely a week ago in the aftermath of the December 28 Andhra train fire. The DNA reports revealed that the body of one of the victims, Aurangabad-based Eshwar Nagare, 70, had been buried by the family of another victim, S Bheemaiah, 55, from Sedam in Gulbarga district. The authorities' decision to release the body to Bheemaiah's relatives on the condition that they bury, and not cremate it, saved the day. Relatives of Sakina Arsiwala, a resident of Jariwala building, said she had celebrated the engagement of her son some time ago, and was travelling to Dahod in Gujarat for a family gathering. The stationmaster at Dahanu recognised her from the photograph her family members were carrying, and 'thought' he had helped her back on the train after the incident.

"We are hopeful that she's alive. Our relatives are in Dahanu, Vapi, Valsad and other places, looking for her in hospitals and clinics," said her relative Amir Masta.

Indore-based Hakimuddin Rassiwala and his wife had travelled to Mumbai to attend a wedding, and were on their way to Godhra in Gujarat. The couple's son, Mustali, said he and the relatives have been waiting at the hospital since 7 am Thursday. "The hospital authorities tell us to approach the Palghar police. They should show some compassion," he said.

Divisional Railway Manager (Western Railway) Shailendra Kumar said the railway officials were trying their best to help out the relatives, but without the DNA reports, there is only so much they could do.

"We made sure we contacted all those who opted out and traced the missing passengers. Now, we have no option but to wait for the reports," he said.

Friday 10 January 2014

http://www.mumbaimirror.com/mumbai/others/It-will-take-6-weeks-to-identify-the-four-badly-charred-bodies/articleshow/28608010.cms

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Helicopter body recovery begins

Search and rescue teams have begun the methodical process of removing bodies from a Norfolk marsh after a US Airforce officer paid tribute to four American crew members killed in a helicopter crash.

Captains Christopher S. Stover and Sean M. Ruane and Technical Sergeant Dale E. Mathews died when their Pave Hawk helicopter came down on a marsh near Cley-next- the-Sea on Tuesday night. Their female crew mate Staff Sergeant Afton M. Ponce was also killed in the crash. Colonel Kyle Robinson, 48th Fighter Wing commander, told reporters at RAF Lakenheath, where the wing is based: "I am deeply saddened by the loss of these great airmen. They have made the ultimate sacrifice while training to save the lives of others."

He added that no May Day message or any other warning of problems on board the helicopter was sent before the crash.

Speaking at the village of Salthouse, near the crash scene, Chief Superintendent Bob Scully said teams were now "actively recovering the bodies".

It is hoped the operation will be completed by darkness, with the bodies due to be taken to the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital ahead of post-mortem examinations.

He warned it was important to balance the families' desire for a quick resolution with the need to preserve evidence.

Rain, wind and plummeting temperatures hampered the rescue effort today. Mr Scully said teams were prepared to work through the night if necessary.

He added: "We need to take care of the deceased in an appropriate and dignified way.

"I sincerely hope they will be safely taken from the scene by the end of the day but I can't offer any guarantees.

"I fully understand the families' distress at such a terrible time but they as much as anyone will want answers about how this happened.

"Our number one priority is recovering the bodies along with sensitive evidence from the crash site but that must be done step, by step, by step."

Asked about ammunition which was strewn across the marsh in the crash, he said it was not a priority as it posed no immediate threat to the public as long as people respect the 400-metre cordon around the site.

RAF mountain rescue teams and heavy loading equipment were seen arriving at the site throughout the day.

Col Robinson sent a message to the families of those who died at a press conference at Lakenheath: "As a husband and father myself, I cannot imagine how heartbroken you must feel, now missing a piece of your family. I speak for the entire wing when I say that we are thinking of you, we are praying for you, and we are here for you."

Captains Stover and Ruane were the pilots, while Tech Sgt Mathews and Staff Sgt Ponce were acting as special mission aviators in the low-level combat search and rescue training mission.

Both Col Robinson and Mr Scully said it was too early to speculate on what caused the crash.

Air accident, RAF and US investigators spent yesterday at the scene of the disaster, where debris is believed to have been strewn across an area the size of a football pitch.

The cordon is expected to remain in place for several weeks as more detailed investigations take place.

Since the crash, birdwatching groups and residents have repeated long-held concerns over low-flying training exercises.

Richard Kelham, chairman of Cley parish council, said the crash highlighted concerns about the impact of low-flying helicopters on the nature reserve.

He said: "It has been an ever-present issue for the last 20 years or so. If anything, it's got better in recent years as RAF bases have closed.

"The concern is more for the birds than anything else as local people are quite used to it.

"This has brought it to the fore again and, while we don't want a knee-jerk reaction, this is a chance to discuss whether anything can be done to improve the situation."

When asked about warnings from local residents about low flying, Col Robinson said: "I'm not aware of any warnings that we had.

"Obviously we take great care to make sure we operate in the safest fashion and all the rules and missions that they follow are the standard ones followed by the Ministry of Defence."

A derivative of the more famous Black Hawk helicopter, the Pave Hawk gets its name from the Pave acronym standing for Precision Avionics Vectoring Equipment.

They are used for combat search and rescue, mainly to recover downed aircrew or other isolated personnel in theatres of war.

They have a four-man crew and can carry up to 12 troops. Typically, training flights would replicate real missions as closely as possible, which would mean weapons and ammunition would be carried.

Speaking about the experience of the four crew members, who were from the 56th rescue squadron, Col Robinson said: "As you would imagine, with most crews there is a range of experience levels and in general you have some of the more experienced people will fly with some of the less experienced people and this crew is no different.

"They are all highly qualified in what they did and capable."

The colonel said there were no plans to fly the four Pave Hawk helicopters from Lakenheath for the rest of the week to give crew and their families time to come to terms with the incident.

"This has obviously been a very traumatic incident for an entire Liberty Wing family and in particular the 56th and we want to maintain and make sure we are taking care of the families and that the air crew members are safe before they head back out," he said.

In a separate incident, a US Navy helicopter with five crew members crashed into the ocean off the Virginia coast during a routine training mission, killing two and leaving two in hospital.

Rescuers searched into the night for a fifth sailor.

The two who died were among four crew members hoisted from the 5C (42F) waters by a Navy helicopter and taken to a hospital, the US Navy said.

The Navy identified the aircraft as an MH-53E.

Thursday 09 January 2014

http://news.uk.msn.com/us-helicopter-body-recovery-begins

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More bodies turning up in Tacloban

Piles of debris left by Supertyphoon Yolanda here continue to disgorge the bodies of those who died in the world’s strongest storm in recent history.

A group called Task Force Cadaver, formed by the city government, said members of the task force are still retrieving bodies from piles of debris in different parts of this city, which bore the brunt of Yolanda.

Senior Supt. Pablo Cordeta, head of the task force, said the team has been recovering five to seven bodies every day, and expects to find even more.

Cordeta said clearing activities in the villages, especially where there are still heaps of uncollected garbage left by the storm, are helping in the team’s recovery operations.

As of Jan. 4, the task force, which has resumed operations after the Christmas break, has recovered 17 more bodies, mostly in the San Jose district, composed of several coastal villages.

All bodies collected by the task force are brought to Barangay (village) Suhi, 13 kilometers north of the city proper.

Tecson John Lim, city administrator, said at least 1,305 bodies had been brought to the village of Suhi where these had been buried in a mass grave in the compound of the village’s health center.

Lim said the burial of the bodies had been finished on Jan. 5.

Aside from corpses that had been buried in Suhi, at least 1,200 more bodies had been buried at the public cemetery of Basper town, he said.

Lim said that 66 bodies still have to be buried as they are still being processed by the National Bureau of Investigation’s forensic experts.

NBI forensic experts collect marks or specimens such as clothes, small bones and dental parts, among others, for identification. The specimens are to be kept for future reference.

Lim said the bodies are, in the meantime, being kept in a refrigerated trailer van donated by the Philippine Red Cross.

He said the death toll in Tacloban City alone has gone past 2,000.

Villagers had been taking part in clearing operations that are part of a cash-for-work program launched by the Buddhist Tzu Chi Foundation.

The foundation pays villagers P500 each for a day’s work.

The United Nations Development Program has also initiated a separate cash-for-work program for villagers helping in clearing operations in the city.

The government has slowed the counting of the dead in areas hit by Yolanda after President Aquino, in a CNN interview, disputed initial reports that the death toll from the 300 kph typhoon is likely to hit 10,000.

Aquino, during the CNN interview, said the death toll could be closer to 2,000.

The burial of the dead in this city and other areas struck by Yolanda has been delayed because of continuing rain in the areas and by the slow process of collecting DNA samples that could help in the identification process.

Thursday 09 January 2014

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/560411/more-bodies-turning-up-in-tacloban

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Nine killed as fire breaks out in Mumbai train

Nine people were killed when fire broke out in the Dehradun Express early on Wednesday morning near Dahanu Road in Thane, Maharashtra.

The fire, which broke out in the S4 coach, spread to two more coaches, S2 and S3.

The train had left Mumbai at 12am and was on the Mumbai-Surat line when the fire broke out around 2am.

Of those killed, five have been identified, Western Railway (WR) officials said. Three of them are from Mumbai, while two are from Gujarat.

According to WR spokesperson Sharat Chandrayan, four of those identified died due to asphyxiation.

The identities of the rest could not be established as their bodies have been charred beyond recognition.

Railway officials claimed the guard noticed the fire and brought the train to a halt, and separated the three coaches from the rest of the train. Passengers too were alerted by the smoke.

Officials said casualties were limited because the train wasn't fully booked. There were 24 passengers in S2, seven in S3 and 51 in S4.

Railway officials claimed that they suspect the fire could have resulted from a short circuit in the S4 coach. The Railway Board has constituted an inquiry into the causes of the fire.

The commissioner of Railway Safety will conduct an inquiry into the fire incident, Railway Board Chairman Arunendra Kumar said.

A team from Kalina Forensic Laboratory has collected samples from the accident site.

Officials claimed that relief reached the passengers in about 40 minutes and that they were transported to Golwad station. However, passengers claim the help did not get to them until after 4am.

The Railways has offered a compensation of Rs 5 lakh to the next of kin of the dead. Rs 1 lakh will be given to those seriously injured and a sum of Rs 50,000 will be given to those who received minor injuries, Kumar said.

DNA tests

DNA tests will be conducted on four unidentified bodies of the nine passengers who died in Wednesday's Dehradun Express fire in Thane, near the Maharashtra-Gujarat border, an official said here Thursday.

"Their bodies have been burnt beyond recognition and hence it has been decided to conduct DNA tests," a Western Railway spokesperson told IANS.

The victims are believed to have been travelling in S-2 and S-3 coaches, which along with S-4 caught fire around 2.35 a.m. early Wednesday near Gholvad, around 145 km north of Mumbai.

The bodies are in custody of the Government Railway Police which will arrange for the DNA testing and later complete the formalities of handing these over to the bereaved families.

Nine passengers, including a woman, were killed when a fire engulfed the three sleeper coaches of the speeding Mumbai Bandra Terminus-Dehradun Express.

The fire which ravaged three sleeper coaches of the train caught the sleeping passengers unawares. It was first noticed by Jawahar Singh, a level-crossing gateman who alerted the Gholvad station master.

The Commissioner of Railway Safety will conduct an inquiry.

Thursday 09 January 2014

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/indiahome/indianews/article-2536137/Nine-killed-fire-breaks-Mumbai-train.html

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/379464/dna-tests-identify-train-fire.html

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Death toll rises to 24 in Goa building collapse

With the recovery of three more bodies from the debris, the death toll in Canacona building collapse in Goa has risen to 24.

"We recovered three more bodies from the debris of the building last night and search is on for more," Ashok Menon, in-charge of rescue operation, said on Wednesday.

He said the rescue operations had been continuing manually after buildings adjacent to the site tilted.

The demolition of these buildings is likely to start from Wednesday, he added.

More than 40 people were trapped under the debris when the under-construction five-storey building caved in on Saturday afternoon.

Police had arrested Deputy Town Planner Prakash Bandodkar on Monday night in connection with the collapse. However, Municipal Engineer Ajay Desai and three directors of a property firm (Bharat Realtors and Developers), constructing the structure, are still untraceable.

Thursday 09 January 2014

http://post.jagran.com/death-toll-rises-to-24-in-goa-building-collapse-1389249002

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15 killed, six buildings burnt in Lagos tanker crash

No fewer than 15 people were burnt to death when a tanker laden with petrol fell and went up in flames Tuesday night. The inferno lasted till yesterday morning, at the Berger Suya junction, Apapa, Lagos. Also, several buildings, eight vehicles and about 200 lock-up shops including a commercial bank in the area were razed. There were, however, conflicting accounts of the number of casualities.

While Federal Fire Service and National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA, put the figure at 15, the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency, LASEMA, and the State fire service said only five bodies were recovered. The fire which started at about 10:35pm on Tuesday was said to have been caused by a tanker laden with 33,000 litres of petrol which lost control as it was negotiating a sharp bend. It exploded close to suya spots in the area.

The driver of the truck, his assistant, several passengers in two commercial buses, by-standers and two Hausa suya vendors were burnt beyond recognition. Rescue workers were seen picking and collecting bones and burnt human parts into cellophane bags. A commercial bank was not spared as a part of the building which housed the Automated Teller Machines, ATMs, was badly damaged.

Eyewitnesses said that the bank guard was trapped and burnt in the inferno. Fire fighters led by the Director, Lagos State Fire Service, Fadipe Razaq Idowu, had hectic time combating the fire which lasted about five hours. Speaking with Vanguard early yesterday, Idowu stated that the team which comprises 21 officials responded promptly with three fire trucks each containing 10,000 litres of water. According to him, each of the trucks was replenished three times.

He said: “The State Fire service responded with three fire trucks, each containing 10,000 litres and was replenished three times. We also used 600 litres of synthetic chemical foam to stop the raging fire, if not, the whole building would have been razed.” Idowu disclosed that the tanker which was carrying about 33,000 litres of petrol, went up in flames after it lost control when trying to negotiate a bend at the Berger Suya Junction leading to Wilmer. Reacting to the number of deaths recorded, Idowu stated that five bodies were evacuated by Lagos State Environmental Unit at the spot.

The General Manager, Lagos State Emergency Management Agency, LASEMA, Dr. Femi Oke-Osanyintolu, said 15 people died in the conflagration. But an eyewitness said more than 15 people were burnt beyond recognition. “It will be more than that (15 people). They don’t know what they are saying. Two buses which were at the spot when the incident happened caught fire and all the occupants were burnt. The suya sellers including a woman selling orange at the junction were burnt.

One of the executives of the Berger Suya Traders Association, Gabriel Ojum, cried that they were like orphans now having lost everything they had laboured for. He said he lost more than N5 million worth of goods to the inferno. He disclosed that more than 200 shops were affected with goods burnt. Ojum pointed to another member of the executive of the union who lost about 30 articulated vehicle engines, each costing about N850,000.

How it happened

An eyewitness, who resides in the area told Vanguard that the tanker, which number plate could not be identified was coming from Kirikiri jetty and lost control probably as a result of brake failure. He said the tanker fell as it was trying to negotiate a bend and caught fire immediately. “As it lost control, the truck fell close to the suya spot at the junction with its content spilling across the road into the immediate environment, from the suya furnace it wildly spread to the street.

The driver and the conductor were trapped in the truck which was burnt beyond recognition. Two buses which were carrying several passengers were also burnt without a survivor. A woman who sold oranges at the junction; a guard in the bank was also burnt to death. Some policemen at the junction were also not spared. But I don’t know whether they (the policemen) survived it or not.”

On how it spread to the adjoining street where about 200 shops were affected, another resident, who also lost goods worth about N5million to the inferno said: “As the tanker fell, its content (petrol) spilled and flowed into the gutters and as the fire began, it spread immediately to the gutters, linking the shops and vehicles parked along the road. The entire area was gutted.

We immediately reached the fire service, which responded promptly.” An eyewitness said the fire was put out at around 3:00 am yesterday with property and goods estimated at N500million destroyed. This is a bad New Year gift —Victims Edwin Ibe, who had just returned from his village for the Christmas celebration said he lost more than N45 million worth of goods. He described the incident as bad new year gift.

A middle aged father of six who spoke amid tears, lamented: “As you can see, I lost a lot of money here. Not only that my engines worth more than N25 million got burnt to ashes, a fairly new trailer that I recently acquired which is worth over N15m was also burnt.” Promise Lezieanya, a trader, absolved the tanker driver of blame saying “he tried his best to maneouvre shouting that the truck had lost its brake as he was approaching the junction.

“A commercial bus by the side which was fully loaded with passengers to Wilmer got burnt. No one survived in the bus. I counted more than 28 people, 94 shops, eight motorcycles and eight vehicles that were burnt that night. I lost 38 pieces of engines to the fire outbreak each at the rate of N1.1m and a new truck that I had sold at the rate of N7million but had not delivered to the owners. All the Okada riders that used to stay at the junction were all burnt to ashes,” he narrated.

Fire fighters No fewer than 21 men from the state fire service were busy fighting the fire with about 90,000 litres of water. The State Director, Lagos State fire service, Fadipe Razaq Idowu stated that apart from the fact that three trucks were used, they also used 600 litres of synthetic chemical foam to stop the raging fire. He, however, acknowledged the support of private fire units of Julius Berger and the Navy which complemented the state fire service to combat the inferno.

Looting spree

Razaq told Vanguard that street urchins had a field day looting as the fire was raging. He noted, “Many of them were carrying machete, sledge hammer and other dangerous weapons trying to loot. They impeded our work, we would have recorded more successes if they had stayed out of our way.” Another eyewitness indicated that looters were trying to gain access into the ATM compartment of the affected bank just as others were busy vandalising property around.

Lagos government reacts Lagos State Government yesterday described the Apapa fire incident which killed 15 people as a shock,saying “in order to avoid this, that was why the state government embarked on the enforcement of the 2012 road traffic law.” Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Mr. Lateef Ibirogba, while reacting to the inferno said: “We noted it and have always advised full compliance with the Lagos Road Traffic Law 2012 in terms of maintenance of vehicle road worthiness, compliance with speed limits and use of indicator lights.

“That’s why we also reorganised and strengthened our Vehicle Inspection Agency. There’s often a tendency for tanker drivers to resist enforcement, gang up and threaten to withdraw their service. We must all resist this and insist on full compliance with the Law.” Lagos records 194 fire incidents in 39 days The inferno was the 194th fire incident that Lagos would witness in 39 days since December 2013. As of Tuesday, Mr Rasak Fadipe, told the News Agency of Nigeria, NAN, that 193 fire outbreaks had occurred in Lagos within the last one month. Before the Berger Suya disaster, Fadipe said the last incident occurred on January 7 at about 3.08 a.m., at Sawmill Market, Ipaja, Lagos.

Thursday 09 January 2014

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2014/01/15-burnt-death-lagos-tanker-fire/

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At least 15 people killed in road accident in Pakistan

At least 15 people were killed and 26 others injured when two passenger vans coming from opposite directions fell into a ravine after hitting each other near Pakistan's northern city of Murree on Wednesday night, police officials and hospital sources said.

Ishtiaq Shah, chief traffic police officer, said that 15 dead bodies have been recovered from the accident site and the death toll may further rise as several passengers are still trapped in the ill-fated vans.

Talking to Xinhua over the phone, Doctor Ayesha Isani, spokesperson for Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences Islamabad, said that they have received 26 injured people and four dead bodies so far at the hospital, while more are being brought in.

Local state TV channel PTV said that the passenger vans with altogether over 50 people on board collided and fell into a 150- 200 feet deep ravine while passing each other in Salgirah area of Murree, a resort in the country's Punjab province.

The accident apparently happened due to the slippery roads caused by light rains, but further investigations are going on.

Rescue officials said that they are facing problems in their work due to poor visibility and rainy weather.

Rescue work is still under way and over 12 ambulances are taking part to shift the injured people to capital city Islamabad, about 29 km away from the accident site.

The Army has also been called by the traffic police to help carry out rescue work.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif took notice of the accident and expressed sorrow over the tragedy.

He directed concerned officials to expedite the rescue work and advised traffic officials to formulate a comprehensive traffic plan during the rainy season.

Thursday 09 January 2014

http://voiceofrussia.com/news/2014_01_09/At-least-15-people-killed-in-road-accident-in-Pakistan-3761/

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Japan's move to repatriate war dead will face backlash from China, S Korea

The Japanese government is drawing up legislation that will make the repatriation of the bodies of its second-world-war dead a “state responsibility”, but analysts anticipate the initiative will attract renewed criticism from China and South Korea.

The legislation is scheduled to be submitted to the Diet before the end of the month and the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) is seeking the support of other parties.

Given the LDP’s majorities in both houses of parliament, the legislation is expected to pass with little debate.

Under the proposal, specialist staff will be sent on diplomatic missions in countries where Japanese troops were killed during the conflict with the task of gathering information about the locations of grave sites and battlefields.

Additional funding will also be provided for the work of recovering and repatriating any remains that are located, although no specific figure has been placed on the amount that will be made available.

“Internal Affairs Minister [Yoshitaka] Shindo has been quite adamant in proposing this kind of effort in recent years and there are now many other like-minded politicians in Prime Minister [Shinzo] Abe’s government,” Yoichi Shimada, a professor of international relations at Japan’s Fukui Prefectural University, told the South China Morning Post.

Shindo was fiercely criticised earlier in January after paying his respects at Tokyo’s Yasukuni Shrine just days after Abe had paid an official visit to the controversial war shrine.

“I believe it is quite natural for any country to try to recover the remains of its soldiers and it is shameful that previous administrations have not done anything about this situation sooner,” Shimada said.

An estimated 2.4 million Japanese were killed at home and overseas during the second world war, with the remains of around 1.13 million people still unaccounted for.

The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare has in recent years made tentative efforts to recover remains, with around 2,000 bodies repatriated in both 2011 and 2012.

The government is aiming to increase that number rapidly and records suggest that some 600,000 bodies can be recovered.

The vast majority of these were troops killed in land battles across Southeast Asia and the Pacific islands. Tens of thousands died in the fierce fighting in places such as New Guinea, the Philippines, Tarawa, Palau, Guam and Myanmar.

While some were buried in mass graves, others were simply bulldozed into the caves they were defending because it was too dangerous for American troops to try to capture the strongpoints.

“One of the reasons for this new effort is to strengthen diplomatic ties with other nations, such as Myanmar,” said Shimada. “There are the remains of many Japanese killed in Myanmar that have still to be found and it has been hard for Japan to deal with the totalitarian government there in recent years.

“Through this initiative, we can improve our relations and face up to China together.”

Given the deteriorating relationship between Tokyo and Beijing in recent months, however, it is unlikely that China will co-operate in the recovery effort.

Shimada dismisses the impact of Chinese intransigence.

“Most of the cremated remains of men killed in China and on the Korean Peninsula were repatriated during the conflict because they are close to Japan,” he said. “Most of the missing are in Southeast Asia or around the labour camps in Siberia where they were held after being captured by the Soviet Union in the latter stages of the war.

“It is true that no matter what Japan does diplomatically at the moment, China complains,” he added. “But I believe their aggression towards Japan and other nations in the region – the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam and others – will only stir up resentment against their heavy-handed tactics.”

Thursday 09 January 2014

http://www.scmp.com/news/asia/article/1401461/japans-move-repatriate-war-dead-will-face-backlash-china-s-korea-analysts

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In 2013, 110 found dead in Chennai bus terminal

Bus stations are meant to be transitory points but not usually for a final trip to the great beyond. And yet police have in the past year found the bodies of 110 people in the teeming Chennai Mofussil Bus Terminus, through which 2 lakh people pass every day.

Most of the dead were elderly people, abandoned by their families, CMBT police inspector Sam Vincent said. Policemen take it on themselves to give those who are unidentifiable a decent burial, performing the funeral rites for more than 100 people in 2013.

Vincent, who maintains a record of elderly people rescued from the bus terminus and of those found dead, said policemen were forced to spend most of their time keeping track of bodies found in the terminus, attempting to identify the dead and contacting their relatives, or trying to trace the origins of elderly people abandoned by their families. "It's just part of the job," Vincent said. "It is our duty to make sure the dead are buried respectfully." With more than 800 long distance buses arriving or departing daily, police at the station often find it impossible to track down relatives of people abandoned or identify the dead.

In some instances, people are found dead on the platforms in the terminus. Bus crews also discover the bodies of people in their vehicles at the end of a trip.

Others who frequent CMBT, like autorickshaw driver Prabhu Kumaran, say they have seen people abandoning elderly relatives at the terminus. "They come by autorickshaw and vanish after leaving behind elderly people," Kumaran said. "Most of the senior citizens left behind are disabled in some way. They either cannot speak or hear; some cannot walk or take care of themselves."

He says he alerted the CMBT police about elderly people being abandoned at the terminus on three occasions in six months.

Inspector Vincent says the CMBT police have to deal with around 35 % of all the unidentified people found dead in the city. The 135 police stations in Chennai report four to five cases a month .At the CMBT police station, the number scan be as high as 12-14 each month.

"Police constable K Selvamani does a very tough job. He has disposed of most of the bodies found at CMBT," Anna Nagar deputy commissioner of police S Xavier Dhanraj said.

Selvamani , 36, a native of Chidambaram who lives with his family in Korattur, joined the force in 1999. "I was initially hesitant when I found a body in the terminus because I did not want to get involved. But giving abandoned people a proper burial now gives me peace of mind," he said.

"I am not a pious man," he said. "But I don't understand how people who go to temples to worship can dump elderly people or the bodies of the dead in a bus terminus."

Wednesday 08 January 2014

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chennai/In-2013-110-found-dead-in-Chennai-bus-terminal/articleshow/28532276.cms

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US military helicopter crashes in Britain, munitions across site

British police said on Wednesday they would be working with the US Air Force and others to find out why a US military helicopter crashed on the coast of eastern England, killing all four crew on board.

Wreckage included munitions was spread over a wide area of the crash site in difficult terrain. The helicopter, a Pave Hawk assigned to the 48th Fighter Wing based at RAF Lakenheath air base, was performing a low-level training mission along the Norfolk coast when it went down in marshland on Tuesday evening. The cause of the crash, which occurred in a nature reserve near the village of Cley next the Sea, was not known. The area is about 130 miles (210 km) northeast of London. "We will be working with our partners at the Ministry of Defence, Air Accident Investigation Branch and US Air Force to gather all evidence from the scene and then recover the aircraft," said Chief Superintendent Bob Scully of Norfolk Constabulary, the local police force. "This is difficult terrain with marshland and tides coupled with wreckage containing munitions covering a large area," he said in a statement.

A 400-metre (quarter mile) area around the crash site remained cordoned off to preserve public safety. No one on the ground was thought to have been hurt, authorities said. Earlier, the 48th Fighter Wing, which also flies F-15 fighter jets, confirmed the deaths of all four airmen on board and said their names would be released 24 hours after their next-of-kin had been informed. The Pave Hawk is made by Sikorsky Aircraft Co, a unit of United Technologies Corp . According to the US Air Force website, it is a modified version of the Army Black Hawk and its primary mission is "to conduct day or night operations into hostile environments to recover downed aircrew or other isolated personnel during war". RAF Lakenheath is home to Europe's only F-15 fighter wing.

Mr Scully told the press conference: 'The crashed aircraft did contain ammunition. 'That ammunition is not of any great significance. It is bullets, if you will, but those are scattered about that area that I just described to you, and so the site is hazardous to members of the public and those people that would normally visit this area for birdwatching and other nature-interest activities, so for the present time we will be assisting and working with the military to ensure public safety by restricting access to that area.'

SCATTERED DEBRIS

Scully told reporters at Cley next the Sea that debris was scattered across an area about the size of a football field. Most of the debris was in marshland although some of it was vulnerable to high tides and was being removed swiftly.

Scully said a coroner, who under English law will be responsible for the investigation into the four deaths, was carrying a daylight assessment and once he had given his consent, authorities would arrange for the removal of the bodies. "The situation that we have now is that we are obviously moving from a potential rescue operation to one of preserving the scene and carrying out an investigation," Scully told reporters. "We are now working with the US military and the RAF (Britain's Royal Air Force) to assist in their investigation and ours at the present time, and at some point we will hand over to the air investigation side of the military, both UK and US"

A second helicopter, which had been taking part in the same training exercise as the one that crashed, had landed at the site and was still there, Scully said. "It will be a matter for the investigation to determine whether or not there was any causal link. My understanding is that apparently not, but we don't know. And that's the important thing, we shouldn't be speculating here," Scully said.

Inquiries into the cause of the crash, as well as the recovery of the wreckage and the second aircraft, are expected to take a number of days to complete, due to the geography and the munitions from the crashed helicopter.

The cordon remains this morning and the A149 through Cley is closed.

NATURE RESERVE STAFF RUSH TO HELP EMERGENCY SERVICES Staff at the nature reserve close to where the Pave Hawk crashed gave emergency services advice when they first arrived on the scene.

The head of the wildlife trust which runs Cley Marshes reserve said he initially feared two people on the ground could have been killed.

Brendan Joyce, chief executive of the Norfolk Wildlife Trust, told the Norwich Evening News: 'I was concerned when I heard four people had lost their lives. The initial reports were it was an Apache helicopter, and they only fly two, so I wondered who else was involved.'

He added: 'My understanding is that it came down on the shingle bank, so not on the actual reserve. We don’t know what the cause was at all.

'It would have been dark. There would not have been any staff or volunteers on the site at the time.

'I do know that our staff locally initially assisted in terms of advice to the emergency services.

'Obviously the emergency services and military have taken over pretty quickly and have sealed the area off. We are not involved.

'We are deeply shocked by it and our first thoughts are with the families of those who have lost their lives.'

Details of the four crew members will not be released until next of kin have been informed and it is not believed that anyone in the surrounding area has been injured, police said.

Norfolk Constabulary Assistant Chief Constable Sarah Hamlin said: 'I would like to pass on my condolences to the family, friends and colleagues of those US Air Force personnel who have sadly lost their lives in this tragic incident.

'Emergency services, the military, partner agencies and volunteers have been working through the night to deal with this difficult situation on our coastline and I would also like to thank them for their professionalism and resilience.

'As our inquiry moves on today and the recovery of the aircraft begins, I would urge the public to stay away from the area - the cordon and road closures are in place to allow our experts to carry out these processes safely and there is no risk to members of the public if this section of marshland is avoided.'

Bernard Bishop, a Norfolk Wildife Trust warden based at Cley, said his house overlooks the crash site and he had never seen anything like it.

'I heard the helicopter flying overhead and watched from my back garden,' he said.

'It was very quickly obvious something serious was wrong. The search and rescue crews quickly arrived and it was my job to escort them over the marsh.

'The conditions are very difficult because the marsh has flooded twice in recent weeks so that's hampering their efforts to recover the bodies and make the helicopter safe.

'There's only one track in and out of the crash site, which is also restricting their movements. It's just awful. I've never known anything like and never seen so many people here at one time.'

Peter and Sue McKnestiey, who run Cookies crab shop in Salthouse, have been making cups of tea for the search teams.

Mrs McKnestiey said: 'We were watching TV at about 7pm. We heard the helicopter come over very fast and very low.

'I don't know about engines but I am used to the sound of helicopters and this sounded very heavy and very unusual'

Cley Marshes is Norfolk Wildlife Trust's oldest and best known nature reserve. It was purchased in 1926 making it the first Wildlife Trust reserve in the country.

The Cley Marshes website says its shingle beach and saline lagoons, along with the grazing marsh and reedbed support large numbers of wintering and migrating wildfowl and waders, as well as bittern, marsh harrier and bearded tit.

Richard Kelham, chairman of Cley Parish Council, said: 'It looks as though the military helicopter has come down in the middle of the bird reserve. The incident is very sad and there is a 400m cordon surrounding the area.'

Lieutenant Keenan Kunst, who is based at Lakenheath, confirmed that the helicopter that crashed was based there.

An RAF Lakenheath tweet sent later read: 'We can confirm that one of our HH-60G Pave Hawk helicopters was involved in an incident during a training mission outside Cley-Next-The-Sea.'

The RNLI said three of its boats were called out at about 7.45pm but were called back because the incident had happened on land.

A spokesman for the Royal National Lifeboat Institution said: 'We were asked for three lifeboats to respond to reports that an aircraft had possibly ditched in the sea.

'Lifeboats Wells, Sheringham and Cromer were launched at the request of the coastguard but were stood down when it was confirmed that the aircraft had come down over land.'

Wednesday 08 January 2013

http://www.dnaindia.com/world/report-us-military-helicopter-crashes-in-britain-munitions-across-site-1947336

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2535501/BREAKING-NEWS-Four-people-believed-died-helicopter-crash-Norfolk.html

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Goa building collapse: Death toll rises to 19

The death toll in Canacona building collapse has gone up to 19 after one more body was recovered, officials said.

"One body was recovered last evening and another one late night, taking the death toll to 19," Director of Fire and Emergency Services Ashok Menon told PTI.

The rescue operation, which had stopped after two adjacent buildings tilted, resumed yesterday afternoon.

The under-construction building in Chawdi area of Canacona, 70 kms from here, collapsed last Saturday. Its location on a narrow lane, a kilometre off the national highway linking Goa to Karnataka, had made rescue operations difficult.

According to the officials, at least ten more bodies are still under the debris.

The state government has called in special machinery to demolish three adjacent buildings, including the two which are tilted.

The operation to demolish the buildings will start in the afternoon, officials said.

Wednesday 08 January 2014

http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report-goa-building-collapse-death-toll-rises-to-19-1947221

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NBI on Haiyan bodies: No choice but temporary burial

With no refrigerator vans for disaster victim identification (DVI) operations in Yolanda-hit areas, the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) said unprocessed bodies in advanced state of decomposition are left with no choice but a temporary burial.

Dr Wilfredo Tierra, officer-in-charge (OIC) of the NBI Medico-Legal Division, said the bodies will be buried in shallow graves and exhumed later on for processing – an arrangement agreed on with the local government.

In an interview with Rappler on Wednesday, January 8, Tierra explained that "continuous verbal requests" by their bureau for refrigerator vans had been addressed to various agencies even before Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) hit.

Because of the less-than-ideal conditions in their DVI operations work site, the team is able to process only 40 bodies compared to what should normally be 150 bodies in a day.

Thus far, 418 unidentified bodies have been processed for DNA sampling and buried permanently at the Holy Cross Memorial. The samples will be kept for DNA testing later on.

The ante-mortem phase of the process will involve DNA testing of relatives coming forward to compare with that of the dead for identification.

The OIC added that DVI has always been a "tedious, difficult, and costly" process, citing the 5,000 dead bodies in the aftermath of the 2004 tsunami in Thailand which took up to two years to identify.

Constraints

Tierra’s division deploys a 13-man team working on a rotational 9-day basis – including during the previous holiday season when the 418 bodies were processed and buried at the Holy Cross Memorial, contradicting the pronouncement of Tacloban City Mayor Alfred Romualdez that the team halted operations.

The team is composed of forensic doctors, photographers, and chemists from the NBI Forensic Chemistry Division.

Due to the disproportionate number of government personnel to the dead, the team is forced to do tasks other than the processing of bodies. They have been moving bodies as well – a task supposedly for the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP).

The NBI team on scheduled rotation, he said, also faces other constraints, including the frequent rain in the area which causes flooding and makes it harder to harvest specimen for processing.

In the initial phases, the lack of air transportation was also a problem.

Despite the constraints, the NBI assured the public that it is relying on tried and tested protocol – the Interpol DVI standards.

Tierra – who has been with the NBI Medico-Legal Division for 17 years now – said the Interpol DVI standards are in accordance with the protocol that the team employed in previous natural and man-made disasters. These included typhoons Reming, Sendong, Pablo, and the 2006 ULTRA stampede.

Multi-agency task

The NBI Medico-Legal Division is taking the lead in the DVI operations in affected areas, but the Department of Health (DOH) is in charge of the overall management of the dead.

Managing the thousands of dead bodies remains a “multi-agency task,” with the DOH, local government units, AFP, BFP, and non-government agencies such as the World Health Organization and International Committee of the Red Cross.

Tierra said the scale of Yolanda’s devastation is the biggest that he has encountered in his more than a decade of medico-legal service in government.

Super Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) devastated parts of the Eastern Visayas in November 2013, leaving thousands homeless and mourning for the dead.

Speed should not prevail over accuracy

"Speed should not prevail over accuracy," said Justice Secretary Leila De Lima about the ongoing burial of corpses in areas battered by Super Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan).

It is the need for accuracy, among other things, that has delayed burial of the rapidly decomposing bodies.

"The corpses were not buried right away because they were still being processed. Processing is time-consuming," she explained, almost two* months after Yolanda devastated the Eastern Visayas. Processing, she added, is necessary to identify those left dead by the storm.

"We don't want to be turning over the wrong dead bodies to certain families," she emphasized.

The explanation came after the media reported 1,400 bodies left lying on a muddy open field in San Isidro, a farming village on the outskirts of hard-hit Tacloban City. There were also reports of unburied bodies in other devastated areas 7 weeks after the disaster.

She quelled fears that the government was taking its time in burying the bodies, while citizens took it upon themselves to bury loved ones and complete strangers.

"We are on double time to bury bodies, both processed and unprocessed," the DOJ chief said.

. To remedy the slow-going operation, local governments and national agencies agreed to temporarily bury the bodies. They will then be exhumed later on for processing by the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), said De Lima.

Uncooperative weather

Rainshowers that drenched the Eastern Visayas the past few weeks was another major cause of delay.

"There were factors like rainy days in succession. It's difficult to work in a rainy environment. It's one of the causes for the delay in burials," she explained.

Contrary to media reports, the NBI did not stop rehabilitation operations during the holiday break, De Lima clarified. A skeletal force left in Tacloban continued processing of the bodies.

"Before holiday break, there were more than 400 processed bodies which were not yet buried. During the break, they were buried," she said in a mix of English and Filipino.

More help on the way

After an initial rift between the national and local governments that also hampered relief and rehabilitation efforts, De Lima said the two are coordinating closely with one another for burial operations.

More teams of forensic doctors and chemists who can help in the processing of dead bodies are on their way to Tacloban. Three teams were sent there on January 2 and more will be deployed, she said.

Such scientists are needed to identify bodies in an advanced state of decomposition. With their facial features marred by decomposition, only scientific analysis of their DNA can unlock their identities.

Rehabilitation czar Panfilo Lacson said the burial, which started on Thursday, January 2, is expected to be completed on Tuesday, January 7, if the weather cooperates. He said that Health Undersecretary Janette Garin is in Barangay (village) Suhi in Tacloban to personally supervise operations.

The Department of Public Works and Highways sent additional equipment such as backhoes and payloaders, to speed up the mass burial. By Saturday, January 4, the team is targeting the processing and burial of 300 bodies.

Wednesday 08 January 2014

http://www.rappler.com/nation/47496-nbi-haiyan-bodies-no-choice-temporary-burial

http://www.rappler.com/move-ph/issues/disasters/typhoon-yolanda/47186-doj-haiyan-burials-accuracy-speed

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Project to honour 'unrecorded' WW1 dead

A new project is being launched to honour hundreds of “forgotten” soldiers from both world wars who are not currently commemorated.

The National Army Museum, in west London, has established a dedicated unit to investigate cases where the deaths of soldiers, sailors and airmen from the conflicts were inadvertently overlooked by the authorities.

Once each case has been verified, the name of the fallen serviceman will be passed on to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission in order to ensure it is added to a memorial.

The project starts this month and is to run for two years. There is already a backlog of 360 names, submitted by relatives and amateur historians, and the museum believes that this year’s centenary of the outbreak of the First World War will lead to a far greater number of names being put forward, as people research their family history and make discoveries.

Every British or Commonwealth soldier killed in either war should be commemorated by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. However, bureaucratic lapses mean that many were accidentally omitted from the records.

Some experts have suggested there could be as many as 10,000 names mistakenly left off the records, which could now be added.

Among them was Lance Corporal Peter Pollock, 21, killed on the first day of the Battle of the Somme. The omission was detected by amateur historians and his name has been added to the Thiepval Memorial, in France, to those killed in the battle for whom there is no known grave.

The task of investigating such claims was previously performed by the Ministry of Defence, but it will now be taken on by the dedicated, two man team at the museum, in Chelsea, as part of its plans to mark the centenary.

David Bownes, assistant director of the National Army Museum, said: “Restoring honour to the casualties of the World Wars is a deserving enterprise and one that the National Army Museum’s experts are well-equipped to investigate and substantiate.”

The majority of the missing names discovered so far by researchers are from the First World War.

The CWGC was not founded until three years into the conflict, in 1917 – initially as the Imperial War Graves Commission – and did not start its work in earnest until after the war ended. Its role was to ensure that every war dead had an official headstone or, if they had no known grave, were commemorated on an official memorial.

It drew up lists of the dead and set about trying to locate those already buried, but in an era before computers, many of the dead appear to have fallen from the records or otherwise been lost in the fog of war.

Many of those omitted were those, like Pollock, the son of a Presbyterian minister, serving in the Royal Irish Rifles, whose bodies were never found.

John Bull, from Stockport, was also killed on the first day of the Somme – July 1 1916 – and like Pollock his body was never recovered.

Bull had enlisted in the second Pals battalions of the Manchester Regiment in September 1914, alongside three brothers, Ernest, William and Abraham.

Due to an error, his death was not properly recorded – although that of his brother Ernest, fatally wounded on the same day, was – and his name was not passed on to the Commission, until it was found to be missing by researchers. His name has now joined Pollock’s on the Thiepval memorial.

Many of those overlooked died of wounds or illness, away from the front line, among them Reginald Buckman, 25, a footman from Ardingly, Sussex who was serving as a Bombardier in the Royal Field Artillery. He died of his injuries in hospital in London in October 1916, a month after being shot on the Western Front. He now has an official headstone on his grave in Highbrook, West Sussex.

Wednesday 08 January 2014

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/world-war-one/10557073/Project-to-honour-unrecorded-WW1-dead.html

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Kegworth air disaster: The day disaster struck as passenger plane fell from the skies on to M1

The village of Kegworth is marking the 25th anniversary of a fatal air disaster with which its name will always be associated.

On 8th January 1989, a British Midland flight from Heathrow to Belfast crashed into an embankment on the M1 motorway after attempting an emergency landing.

Of the 126 people on board, 47 died and a further 74 were injured.

The Boeing 747 experienced problems soon after taking off from Heathrow Airport. Flight 092 was scheduled to travel from Heathrow to Belfast but was diverted to East Midlands Airport after the pilot reported an emergency situation in one of the engines.

A loud bang from one of the engines sent a ripple of panic through the aircraft, especially as some passengers could see sparks flying from the jet.

Confusion about which of the engines had dropped out led to Captain Kevin Hunt and his co-pilot David McClelland shutting down the only working engine, leaving the plane gliding.

Its tail bounced off the ground about a quarter of a mile from the beginning of East Midlands Airport runway, before it crashed into an embankment on the M1 motorway.

In an astonishing stroke of luck, no vehicles were travelling on that section of the motorway when the plane came down.

The plane was only 20 seconds from the runway but, after narrowly missing the village of Kegworth, the 12-week-old Boeing 737-400 crashed on to the M1.

The fuselage broke into three sections on impact, immediately killing more than 30 of the people on board, the cockpit separating from the main body and the tail folding back.



Most of the deaths occurred at the front of the plane, but 79 people, including the two pilots, survived.

AA patrolmen arriving in the scene spoke at the time of "complete devastation with seats and bodies piled up everywhere".

Firefighters who had been alerted to the mechanical problems were waiting for the flight to land at East Midlands Airport.

When they saw the cloud of smoke, they fought through trees and bushes at the edge of the runway to reach the wreckage.

At Derbyshire Royal Infirmary a major accident was put into operation. A medical flying squad of 16 doctors and nurses travelled to the scene to treat survivors.

Surgeons carried out more than 80 operations during the first 36 hours after the crash.



Having heard about the Kegworth air disaster from a colleague, Professor Wallace rushed to the aid of the people involved and became immersed in a rescue effort in which he oversaw the care of four patients.

Even after his efforts on January 8, 1989, however, Professor Wallace's involvement with the disaster continued.

He started a task force which painstakingly analysed the disaster and revolutionised the safety of air travel.

"I remember the day after the accident, I was chatting to one of my colleagues and we both came to the conclusion that this was an unusual accident," he said.

"We set up a research project which looked at the cause of death in those that died and how the injuries had occurred in those that survived.

"We felt there was an opportunity to look at the safety in a crashed aircraft and how things might be improved – there were lessons that we learned from Kegworth."

The project, called Nottingham Leicester Derby Belfast (NLDB), eventually involved 30 people and produced several major recommendations which were adopted to improve safety.

"A lot of people are now very grateful for them [the changes the research made] – we learned, for instance, that the floors of the airplane at that time were not sufficiently strong because seats were ripped off the floor and a lot of the people at the front of the plane were concertinaed together and effectively crushed to death."



The task group also researched the brace position – which was then adopted as a result.

Professor Fraser said: "We worked on identifying the best brace position and how you should position yourself to reduce to the minimum the issues you get on an impact.

"We believe it has had benefits and there has been a couple of crashes where people did adopt the position and were uninjured. Certainly you reflect on it and think we did that research and we think it has benefited the industry and passengers and we are very proud.

The horror of the event is something that many people won't forget and Professor Fraser, who has worked in Nottingham since 1985 after coming from Manchester, remembers the aftermath clearly.

He said: "I was working in my office at QMC doing some research. My fellow came into my office and said a friend had told him a plane had crashed.

"We went down to the A and E department to see what we could do to help. Within ten minutes, the first casualties appeared and we had severely injured bodies come into Queen's to resuscitate."

The professor of orthopaedic and accident surgery at Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust added: "It did feel different. We were aware it was a serious accident from the severity of the first of the casualties – and as more were delivered, it became clear that this had been pretty awful and that people had been killed and seriously hurt.

"Everybody who was available came to help and we allocated about two or three doctors and nurses to each of the badly injured plane occupants. One of the patients who I looked after had a bad head injury and his skull was missing at the back – others had very severe fractures, abdominal injuries and chest injuries.

"People were in remarkably good control. It's very much a situation where, when things become difficult, you focus on providing the best service you can in difficult circumstances. I think we coped admirably well."

Wednesday 08 January 2014

http://www.itv.com/news/2014-01-08/village-marks-25th-anniversary-of-kegworth-air-disaster/

http://www.nottinghampost.com/day-disaster-struck-passenger-plane-fell-skies-M1/story-20413253-detail/story.html

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Why identifying Typhoon Haiyan's dead matters to the living

The authorities in Tacloban City, capital of Leyte Province in central Philippines, have concluded a mass burial of unidentified bodies retrieved from the debris left by Typhoon Haiyan. In a report published on 7 January, the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) estimated that the category 5 storm had killed more than 6,100 people, and another 1,700 are registered as missing. Some 5,000 deaths occurred in Leyte Province.

In the days immediately after the typhoon, dead bodies littered the streets. Dogs roamed, gnawing on human flesh. Residents are still chilled by the memory and cover their eyes in horror when they recall it. With most facilities destroyed or damaged, local authorities and survivors struggled to tend to the needs of the living in the devastated region. A government psychiatrist walked and, when roads became passable, cycled 10km daily to meet patients who could get to the Eastern Visayas Regional Medical Centre.

Rainwater has had to be pumped out of burial grounds to prevent the body bags from floating. Two government ministries tried to work out where and what was required to bury more bodies than anyone had expected, Tacloban city's mayor, Alfred Romualdez, told IRIN on 5 January, when burials were taking place for the second day. Some 1,400 bodies have been recovered but not claimed in the city so far.

"Where we expected to recover 20 bodies a day going into Christmas [six weeks after the typhoon hit], we were finding 70 to 80. We are still recovering bodies,” he said.

When bodies were first retrieved, up to one week after the typhoon struck in some places, they were haphazardly buried in mass graves. Some were examined, tagged and logged, some were not.

“We left after five days because we could not endure the stench of the cadavers,” said Maria Portia Garcia, who lives in Anibong village, 12km from Tacloban. Her sister died when a ship slammed into the home where she was sheltering, a few hundred metres from the shore. She was buried in a mass grave in San Isidro, a community on the outskirts of Tacloban, two weeks after the typhoon.

Her body is one of hundreds that have been "processed", as forensics experts call it and laid to rest temporarily in a seven-hectare plot in a nearby cemetery, purchased by the local government in the village of Basper. Processing involves tagging bodies, fingerprinting and photographing them, and collecting DNA samples when possible. The information is analysed after reference samples are gathered from the next of kin, which can take months, depending on the number of cadavers. The bodies will be exhumed later for further identification.

“We did not see her body when it was pulled out [of the debris], but we know she is buried now, which brings us some relief,” said Garcia.

The Department of Health (DOH) implements national policy on the management of dead and missing persons during emergencies and disasters.

The Philippine Department of Justice’s National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) is using protocols developed by Interpol, the international police agency, called disaster victim identification (DVI), which borrows from the forensic science used in criminal investigations.

As officials in the Philippines rushed between tending to the living as well as the dead, criticism grew that victim identification was too expensive and, for a grieving public, too time consuming.

The World Health Organization (WHO) and the DOH worked with international forensics expert Stephen Cordner to implement an abbreviated DVI method, developed by the WHO and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), which overlaps with the Interpol method but stops short of immediate DNA sampling.

“With mass casualties on the scale that we’ve seen here, it is difficult to do a full identification in a timely manner. With this information [using abbreviated DVI method], we can identify about 50 percent of bodies,” said Julie Hall, the WHO representative in the Philippines.


This method relies heavily on visual recognition, which may not always be accurate, but cases in doubt can be resolved by DNA sampling, said Hall, who noted that both forensic methods were used after Typhoon Haiyan.

Antonio Vertido, chief medico-legal officer of the NBI, defended the government’s slow pace. “We cannot abbreviate the process because [it follows] international... [protocol]. As much as we’d like to abbreviate the process - we are tired, too - we can’t,” he told IRIN while overseeing a recent mass burial.

Helena Ras, chair of Interpol’s DVI steering committee, said the agency’s DVI protocols are “not just about correctly identifying victims, but also about ensuring that due process is followed to support national legal requirements. For example, the issue of a death certificate, and to avoid potential disputes in the future.”

The problem is not just one of forensics, DOH undersecretary Janet Garin told IRIN. “The Philippines does have a policy on identifying dead bodies, using DNA testing. But in a disaster like this, where you are dealing with thousands of bodies, this is difficult and takes time. People want to closure. But we also had to manage [the] families who [were] demanding DNA testing and matching for positive/confirmatory identification.”

Garin called for the formation of a decision-making body on natural disasters similar to the US Federal Emergency Management Agency to help resolve such disputes. The country's president appointed parliamentarian Panfilo Lacson in December 2013 to oversee and coordinate the government agencies involved in rehabilitation efforts, and to manage typhoon-related spending. Lacson has echoed Garin’s call for centralized decision-making after disasters.

“For people here, just like in other countries, the way a body is treated and buried is very important,” said Lynne Jones, mental health officer of International Medical Corps, who helped write the mental health guidelines for the Inter-agency Standing Committee (IASC), which coordinates UN and non-UN international humanitarian agencies, speaking from the Philippines.

“What survivors are looking for is the recognition of the significance and individuality of their loss. They want their loss to matter,” Jones said. “A burial gives an individual significance to a person's loss and that the helps with closure.”

Tuesday 07 January 2014

http://www.irinnews.org/report/99432/why-identifying-typhoon-haiyan-s-dead-matters-to-the-living

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