Myanmar earthquake death toll exceeds 2,700, but survivors still being found

The head of Myanmar’s military government told a forum for relief donations in Naypyitaw that 2,719 people have now been found dead, with 4,521 others injured and 441 missing.

Rescue workers saved a 63-year-old woman from the rubble of a building in Myanmar’s capital on Tuesday, but hope was fading of finding many more survivors of the violent earthquake that killed more than 2,700 people, compounding a humanitarian crisis caused by a civil war.

The fire department in Naypyitaw said the woman was successfully pulled from the rubble 91 hours after being buried when the building collapsed in the 7.7 magnitude earthquake that hit midday Friday. Experts say the likelihood of finding survivors drops dramatically after 72 hours.

The head of Myanmar’s military government, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, told a forum for relief donations in Naypyitaw that 2,719 people have now been found dead, with 4,521 others injured and 441 missing, Myanmar’s state MRTV television reported.

He said Friday’s earthquake was the second most powerful in the country’s recorded history after a magnitude 8 quake east of Mandalay in May 1912.

The casualty figures are widely expected to rise. The earthquake hit a wide swath of the country, leaving many areas without power, telephone or cell connections and damaging roads and bridges, making the full extent of the devastation hard to assess.

Most of the reports so far have come from Mandalay, Myanmar’s second-largest city, which was near the epicenter of the earthquake, and Naypyitaw, the capital.

“The needs are massive, and they are rising by the hour,” said Julia Rees, UNICEF’s deputy representative for Myanmar.

Myanmar’s fire department said 403 people have been rescued in Mandalay and 259 bodies have been found so far. In one incident, 50 Buddhist monks who were taking a religious exam in a monastery were killed when the building collapsed, and 150 more are thought to be buried in the rubble.