WATCH: A team of firefighters from B.C. are in the middle of the earthquake zone in Nepal, doing all they can to help the devastated country. The firefighters made it to one of the many remote villages, where people are desperate for help. Jackson Proskow made the journey with them and has the story.
A team of firefighters from British Columbia are part of an international effort to help the earthquake ravaged country of Nepal.
More than a dozen members of the Burnaby Fire Department left B.C. early Monday morning, bringing cameras and sound equipment with them, as well as rescue dogs. Two firefighters from Mission also made the journey. Many of the volunteers have significant training and come from Burnaby’s technical rescue team and task force.
They have been going through collapsed buildings, trying to determine their survivability. On Friday, the crew headed toward the village of Bahrabise, roughly 111-kilometres from where they were staying by the Kathmandu airport. The firefighters received a local tip that a church collapsed in the town, trapping up to 100 people inside.
Capt. Dave Samson, a firefighter from Burnaby, said they have been liaising with the Nepalese Army and set off with them to Bahrabise. “We had a local guide who was supposed to know where we were going,” said Samson, adding the road there showed some of the devastation in the countryside. “It was incredible,” he said. “People trying to pick up and sell stuff, that was shocking to see.”
The group passed Bahrabise at first, ending up about six kilometres past it, in a smaller village. “The locals clambered on to us,” said Samson, “and said there was one body in this building that they wanted us to retrieve. Due to the instability of the building however, the firefighters were not able to get inside and retrieve the body.
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“The nice thing was, people were extremely grateful even though we weren’t able to retrieve their family member,” said Samson. They did rescue some chickens that were trapped in the rubble for five or six days before heading back to Bahrabise.
It turned out there were about 16 bodies trapped in the church and those had been recovered by the time the group got there. Now the team is looking ahead to Saturday and what they can do to help before leaving on Sunday.
“We heard from a boy on the road back that he hasn’t seen his mother since their house collapsed during the earthquake, so we might head there tomorrow,” said Samson.
The crew on the ground is in the country on their own time and dime, with a flight paid for by Hong Kong-based airline Cathay Pacific. According to the members, their departments are supporting them and they say they feel a need to give back.
For Samson, he has been saddened and surprised by the devastation in the country and the resiliency of the Nepalese people. “Just seeing some of the complete devastation in these tiny villages,” he said. “It’s so sad to think these people have nowhere to go. When we were in the small village, an elderly man popped his head out of the window of a building that was leaning over by about 30 degrees. The fact that these people are still living in these structures, because they’ve go nowhere to go, there’s no Holiday Inn to check into.”
READ MORE: British Columbians heading to Nepal to provide assistance
Meanwhile, a military transport plane has rescued nearly a hundred Canadian citizens from Nepal.
A second Canadian aircraft will arrive in Kathmandu today and will also be able to transport more Canadians who wish to leave the country.
About 70 Canadians have been able to get out of the country on commercial flights.
More than 5,000 people are confirmed to have died in the magnitude-7.8 earthquake that struck Nepal on Saturday, but there are fears the death toll could hit 10,000 as recovery efforts continue in more remote areas. More than 10,000 people were injured in the quake and the United Nations estimates some 500,000 people are in need of emergency shelter.
Approximately 70,000 houses were destroyed in the quake and subsequent aftershocks, while a further 530,000 homes were damaged.
~With files from Nick Logan and Nadia Stewart.
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