Bangladesh: Red Crescent with the victims of Savar tragedy

21-05-2013 Photo gallery

On 24 April 2013, an eight-storey building collapsed in Savar, an industrial suburb located on the outskirts of the capital, Dhaka. More than 3,000 people were working in factories and shops housed inside the building when it caved in. Volunteers and staff from the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society (BDRCS) rushed to the spot and established a mobile first aid camp to assist the wounded.

The Red Crescent volunteers worked alongside other first responders in the search & rescue operation, and helped with the management of dead bodies. Red Crescent ambulances transported the injured survivors to various hospitals. While 1,127 bodies were recovered from the wreckage, 2,438 people were rescued alive.

The ICRC delegation in Dhaka supported the Red Crescent with 1160 body bags, 20 helmets and pairs of gloves as well as mobile phones to help survivors to give news to their families.

- Friends and families of missing workers seek news of their loved ones at the Red Crescent camp in Savar. Volunteers visited the hospitals where the injured were being treated to give them the chance to inform their family of their condition and whereabouts. Over the three weeks of the rescue operation, the Red Crescent met with family members of 457 missing workers, recorded their personal details and tried to locate their relatives among the injured and dead. Up to 16 May, more than 70 people had been located, the living reunited with their loved ones and the deceased handed over to families for burial.
  © ICRC / O. Shadman
- Abdur Rahman holds out a photo of his 18-year old daughter Aliya, who worked at a factory inside the collapsed building. The bereaved father had travelled all the way from the south-western district of Chuadanga in search of his missing child. The BDRCS spared no effort to help Abdur Rahman locate Aliya in the hospitals or in the morgue.
  © ICRC / O. Shadman
- Throughout the entire operation, 205 trained volunteers of Bangladesh Red Crescent worked round the clock in two shifts. While some of them were involved in searching for people trapped in the collapsed building, others provided First Aid to the wounded, while others made efforts to reunite separated family members.
  © Bangladesh Red Crescent Society
- Youths from the Red Crescent cut through piles of steel, iron and concrete to find people buried underneath.
  © ICRC / O. Shadman
- A Red Crescent volunteer provides first aid to a policeman who got hurt while managing a crowd of mourners demanding bodies of their co-workers and relatives. Since the onset of the disaster, the Red Crescent makeshift camp in Savar provided first aid not only to the injured survivors, but also to other first responders.
  © ICRC / O. Shadman
- A Red Crescent first aid team attends a soldier who had cut his hand while opening an oxygen cylinder. The volunteers later gave the patient CPR as he went into shock while being transported to the Combined Military Hospital.
  © ICRC / O. Shadman
- Shefali (on the right) and seven other co-workers used a screwdriver to dig their way out of the eight-storey collapsed building. After having spent four days in darkness and stench, Shefali was traumatized and in grief over the loss of her aunt, with whom she lived and worked.
  © ICRC / O. Shadman
- Dignified and proper management of the dead in disasters is fundamental in helping families know the fate of their relatives and mourn their dead. A team of Red Crescent volunteers supported the rescuers in carrying the deceased. For identification purposes, physical features and personal belongings were noted down before the bodies were placed inside body bags supplied by the ICRC. 293 bodies still remain unidentified, of which 187 have been tested for DNA.
  © ICRC / O. Shadman

Bangladesh: Red Crescent with the victims of Savar tragedy

21-05-2013 Photo gallery

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