Man, 101, found alive one week after Nepal quake

KATHMANDU — In a miraculous development seven days after the deadly earthquake that hit Nepal left more than 7,000 dead, a 101-year-old man has been rescued from the rubble of his collapsed home.

The Nepalese police said yesterday that Mr Funchu Tamang was found alive on Saturday with minor injuries and airlifted to a district hospital. “The centenarian was trapped under the verandah of the house when the quake struck. We were lucky to have found him alive,” said Nuwakot’s deputy superintendent of police Arun Poudel.

“He suffered minor injuries on his left hand, left leg and chest, and was sent by helicopter to the district headquarters, where he is undergoing treatment at the hospital in Bidur.”

Police officers also quoted doctors as saying Mr Tamang’s condition is stable. The centenarian, who was in his 20s when Nepal’s last major earthquake occurred in 1934, told journalists that he had survived by eating flour and drinking water from containers lying near him. “Those who should have survived lost their lives and someone like me who is near death has found a new life,” he said.

Mr Tamang’s survival against the odds is one of the few stories of hope amid widespread devastation. The government said yesterday that the quake had killed 7,250 people, including six foreigners and 45 Nepalese found over the weekend along a trekking route. The victims include a French national, an Indian, four other foreigners and Nepalese guides, hotel owners, workers and porters, said government administrator Gautam Rimal.

The six foreigners’ remains were found in Langtang Valley in Rasuwa district, nearly 60km north of Kathmandu. The area was buried by a landslide after the earthquake. At least 200 other people are still missing in Langtang, including villagers and trekkers, said Mr Uddhav Bhattarai, a bureaucrat in the district. “We have not been able to reach the area earlier because of rain and cloudy weather.”

Home Ministry official Laxi Dhakal said hopes of finding survivors had faded dramatically. “Unless they were caught in an air pocket, there is not much possibility,” he said. Three survivors were pulled out from the rubble near the mountainous Syauli village last week, government official Surya Prasad Upadhaya said yesterday. It was not immediately clear which day they were found.

Airport congestion became the latest complication in efforts to aid people in the wake of the quake, the country’s biggest and most destructive in 80 years. The main runway was temporarily closed to big aircraft because of damage, said Mr Birendra Shrestha, manager of Tribhuwan International Airport, located on the outskirts of Kathmandu. It had been built to handle only medium-sized jetliners, not the huge planes that have arrived with aid supplies and rescue workers, he added.

Nepali government officials have said efforts to step up the pace of delivery of relief material to remote areas were frustrated by a lack of trucks and drivers, many of whom had returned to their villages to help their families.

United Nations officials said they were increasingly worried about the spread of disease, adding that more helicopters were needed to reach mountain villages that are hard to access. The true extent of the damage is unknown as reports continue to filter in from remote areas, some of which remain cut off.

The UN says the quake affected 8.1 million people — more than a quarter of Nepal’s 28 million. AGENCIES