Chinese rescuers on Monday morning pulled a pregnant woman and her five-year-old daughter out of rubble in quake-hit Mandalay, Myanmar, after they had been trapped for more than 60 hours.
The mother and daughter had been buried under an apartment building called Sky Villa Condominium since 12:50 local time Friday when the 7.9-magnitude earthquake struck central Myanmar.
Hearing the faint knocking sounds made by the mother from beneath the rubble, the Chinese rescuers called for quiet around the rescue site to carefully identify the pair's precise location.
"We determined her location based on her knocking sounds. We required full-site silence to identify better the precise demolition depth needed to reach her," said Wang Mo, leader of the Chinese search and rescue team.
As the victims were trapped in a pancake collapse, the rescuers had to bore a tunnel vertically to reach them. To prevent causing secondary injuries to the pair, the rescuers immediately cleared away the debris fragments after boring through a layer of rubble. After drilling through two layers of collapsed floors, they created a narrow gap between them and the survivors.
The rescuers managed to pull the child and the mother out of rubble at 5:37 and 6:20, respectively, and immediately sent them to the hospital.
They were the second and third survivors the Chinese rescue team saved in Mandalay.
The Chinese rescuers later saved the fourth survivor they have spotted underneath the collapsed Sky Villa -- a 29-year-old woman.
The team had previously rescued their first survivor from underneath the rubble of the Great Wall Hotel, where the woman had been trapped for over 60 hours.
The death toll from the earthquake has risen to 2,056, with approximately 3,900 people injured and nearly 270 reported missing, according to data released by Myanmar's State Administration Council Information Team on Monday.
Chinese rescuers save pregnant mother, child from Myanmar quake rubble
The concept of eco-friendly burials -- ways of laying loved ones to rest that reduce environmental impact -- has grown in popularity among the Chinese people, especially over the past five years.
In China, eco-friendly burials comprise forms such as lawn burials, flowerbed burials as well as tree burials, which require minimal land. Sea burials and biodegradable urn burials that do not take up any land are also popular options.
Analysts believe eco-friendly burials will help to alleviate the strain on land resources, contribute to environmental protection, and also fulfill people's emotional needs for remembering their departed loved ones. The Ministry of Civil Affairs said in 2024, there were 194,700 ecological burials of ashes across the country, up 67 percent from 2019. Among them, 53,500 were sea burials, an increase of 26 percent over 2019, and 141,200 tree burials, an increase of 90 percent over 2019. Today, 28 provinces in China offer rewards and subsidies to families who choose eco-burials.
"More and more people begin to accept land-saving ecological burial methods. China's land-saving ecological burial methods such as sea burials and tree burials have been on the rise every year. China's land-saving ecological burial facilities have become more full-fledged as local governments have increased their efforts to build these facilities," said Liu Tao, director of the Department of Social Affairs under the Ministry of Civil Affairs.
April 4 marked this year's Qingming Festival, also known as Tomb-Sweeping Day, a traditional Chinese festival for people to pay tribute to the deceased and to worship their ancestors.
During the period around this festival, people often visit graveyards, where they traditionally pay tribute to the dead by offering food and burning incense and paper money.
In recent years, with the support from the government, many have turned to greener practices, such as offering flowers and lighting electric candles. During this year's three-day Qingming Festival holiday from Friday to Sunday, people across China made nearly 54.34 million trips to burial sites, up 14.3 percent from last year.
Eco-friendly burials take root among Chinese people
