Rescue workers in dash to find Chile quake survivors

Rescue workers in Chile were battling today to find survivors trapped in rubble a day after a giant earthquake that has claimed at least 400 lives and sent a tsunami barrelling across the Pacific.

Thousands of fearful Chileans were camped in tents and makeshift shelters as powerful aftershocks battered the South American country in the wake of an 8.8 magnitude earthquake that shattered airports, mangled highways and toppled buildings when it hit in the early hours of Saturday morning.

In Concepcion, the worst-hit city with more than 100 killed, rescue workers were picking through the wreckage of a collapsed 15-storey apartment building in the hope of finding survivors among more than 60 people thought to be trapped inside.

Firefighters used thermal detectors to search for signs of life in the building, which was destroyed by the first tremors. One resident, Fernando Abarzua, marvelled that he had escaped with no major injuries. "I was on the eighth floor and all of a sudden I was down here," he said.

Twenty-four hours later, 16 people had been pulled out alive, and six bodies had been recovered.

"We spent the whole night working, smashing through walls to find survivors. The biggest problem is fuel, we need fuel for our machinery and water for our people," Commander Marcelo Plaza said.

Rescue operations were complicated by powerful aftershocks, of which there were more than 60 across the country in the 24 hours following the earthquake

Concepcion, a city of 670,000 people, was strewn with overturned cars, concrete blocks and lampposts, while the Bio Bio bridge folded like a line of dominoes.

Thousands spent Saturday and Sunday nights sleeping in temporary shelters scrambled together from bedsheets or cardboard boxes, and residents were still without water or electricity, while fuel supplies were dwindling rapidly.

As desperation set in, police were deployed to prevent looters from raiding supermarkets for food. "People have gone days without eating," one looter, Orlando Salazar, said. "The only option is to come here and get stuff for ourselves."

Few parts of the country were untouched by the earthquake, with an estimated 2 million people affected and 1.5 million homes and buildings destroyed or badly damaged.

President Michele Bachelet – who has just ten days left in office – said that she found it hard to spell out the magnitude of the disaster, which would take officials several days to assess.