By Zhang Haizhou/Huang Zhiling (China Daily)
Updated: 2008-05-15 07:00

Zhang said workers had been looking for missing colleagues by digging at the collapsed building with shovels and their bare hands.

"Whenever a cry for help was heard among the debris, we would rush there immediately," he said.

Luo Yongxiang, a major from a military training base in the nearby city of Chongzhou, raced to the town on Tuesday afternoon with about 300 soldiers and officers to help with the rescue.

Luo said that by 1 pm yesterday, they had found 300 people in debris.But only one was still alive.

"As time passes, hope of survivors becomes slim. We have to be quick," he said.

Insufficient supplies

Another major problem facing Hanwang is an insufficient supply of basic necessities. Once a vehicle carrying food and water appeared, residents were seen rushing and grabbing whatever was available.

Fortunately, many people have voluntarily driven to Hanwang to offer more supplies.

A yellow bus owned by Deyang's Qiaodan Meiyu Kindergarten had been making frequent trips between Deyang and Mianzhu to offer help since Tuesday morning, said the director of the kindergarten.

At the local Wudu Hospital, physician Jia Zhengping was seen treating patients housed in a makeshift tent outdoors, as hospitals were severely damaged.

"In order to save the patients, some doctors risk their lives by rushing into unstable buildings to fetch medicine," he said.

"We are very short of medical supplies."

Students' savior

Many locals were also deeply moved by how a teacher, Tan Qianqiu, had died saving students.

When rescuers reached Tan in the debris of a collapsed school building on Tuesday night, he was found with his arms wide open over a desk.

Four students were found under the desk. Tan was dead, but the four were alive.

"Without Tan's protection, the students would have died," said a local resident whose niece, Liu Hongli, was one of the fortunate students.

"He is a hero."

Fifty-year-old Tan was a teacher of politics at the middle school attached to the Dongfang Steam Turbine Plant in Hanwang, which collapsed during Monday's earthquake and buried at least 200 students, local authorities have said.

Rescuers found his body at about 10pm on Tuesday.

His wife, Zhang Guanrong, could hardly speak at the sight of her husband's corpse yesterday.

"I overheard that a teacher saved four students last night, but I never expected it to be you..." Zhang whispered to him.

The red-eyed woman carefully wiped clean the face of her husband and combed his hair to the style he liked.

While reaching for the cold fingers of her husband, she burst into tears.

"They were warm and soft two days ago ..." she said.

"Tan was one of the teachers that loved the students most in our school," said another teacher, Xia Kaixiu.

"He would pick up a very small stone on the road for fear of it injuring students."

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