Maternity clinic

Silent, we drive back to the camp, where a new task awaits us. In the very cold weather, the open truck we use now brings us to what was once the maternity clinic of Leninakan. The place of new life is a big cemetery now, where dead bodies lie on the sidewalks for identification and further transport to their last place to rest. We are used to a lot of things, but these little coffins make us swallow hard. Damn, what a misery. It looks like the dogs understand our emotions, because they search very well through the high rubble piles. The alerts are coming quickly and clearly, but under this rubble no one is alive anymore.

While the rescue workers are doing their work, an Armenian asks us to search for his wife. It is already dark when our dogs again bring a sad message. But in spite of his sadness, the man shakes our hands to thank us for our help.

When we come back at eight o’clock in the evening, our food tastes like disinfectant. For just moments, we can have some rest, but two hours later we are awakened. Alarm! Just two minutes later we are in the truck again. We are on our way to the former KGB building of Leninakan. Knock signals were heard at ten o’clock and once again in the evening at six. The rescue workers on that rubble dug first, and when they didn’t find anything, they called us. In answer to my question about why they didn’t call us earlier, the commander shrugs his shoulders. But we can’t lose any time; while rescue workers descend the pile to give us room, the first dog is already searching.

The wife of one of the missing people is yelling hysterically. It is taking too long for her. She loses control and careful hands take her to the side. But she wants to follow the search and stands nearby, just like all others who have missing people under the rubble, already for so many days.

On his way to the top, the first dog locates three places with dead bodies. The handler and commander keep this in mind, while the dog is encouraged to search further. Suddenly the dog walks quickly to a place beside the elevator shaft, puts his nose deep in the rubble for a long time and then begins to scratch the rubble away. The dog looks over his shoulder to check if his handler has seen it. Well, the handler has seen it! The dog is rewarded and the handler takes the dog down to the street.

The second dog goes into action. He gets excited as he begins to search from the other side and first passes the place where the first dog alerted. But then this dog also turns around and walks a few steps back. The human odor coming out of the rubble is blown aside a bit by the wind and that’s why the dogs can only smell it from one side. We feel a great relief when this dog also gives an alert of a living person in the same place.

Immediately, we go into action. We order the dog to inspect the shaft of the elevator, but the odor doesn’t come from there. It is in the enormous rubble pile beside the shaft that the dogs indicate a living person. While we deliberate about the salvage, the military and the interpreter are trying to contact the victim. He is, however, not reacting anymore to knocking and calling. We have no time! Probably the victim is already unconscious.

The commander who was already digging here wants to manage the salvage himself and won’t accept the Austrians taking over his task. There follows a radio call to the coordination center, but the commander is implacable. In the meantime, his people have started digging again where we indicated. It is far from a light job to remove all these heavy pieces with this light-duty salvage equipment. We ask for a heavier crane, but where can you get such a thing in the middle of the night? The light crane they have here has problems with the enormous pieces, and the work is barely progressing. While we help to clear the rubble, we encourage the rescue people to go as far as they can, but it is heavy work. They have already been digging many days in the mass of rubble.

Through the radio we hear that our help is needed a few blocks farther on. Our dogs search again and indicate dead bodies. When a policeman tells me that there are still hundreds of people under the rubble in town, I look at him. I correct him and tell him that I think that there will be thousands of people at least. I ask him when we can expect further Russian help and then it is his turn to look amazed.

After the salvage we quickly go back to the place where they’re trying to dig out the living victim. On our way I see the light of a new day. When we approach the rubble pile, I hear a tumult. Quickly I go to the top of the rubble and I hear what happened. After taking away the rubble, they reached a concrete stairwell. As they were taking it away, one of the heavy pieces of the staircase fell back out of the crane and now this enormous chunk is deep-wedged between other staircase parts. The much-too-light crane can’t get it out. We warn everybody to back away before the cable breaks off. One and a half hours later they succeed in taking the rubble away, so that one of them can get deeper in the rubble. In the shaft they discover, beside the dead body of a woman, the body of a man, tightly wedged between staircase pieces. His lifeless body is still warm when it passes us some time later.

This is something I picture for a long time afterwards. After so many days, almost rescued! But he was one of the many victims of unprofessional assistance, defective or poor salvage equipment and, more importantly, the late call for the help of the search and rescue dogs!

Saturday: That morning, we only have a few hours’ rest, because our help is needed on the rubble. Again there is a gigantic mass of fine rubble in front of us. This mass was once six large apartment buildings. We are looking with amazement at what once were seemingly solid connections between the outside walls and support beams: simple wire with bolts instead of solid steel connections. Later news stories about the poorly built apartments do not surprise us—and this in an area where earthquakes are common. We see this for ourselves because of the many aftershocks. You get the feeling of being drunk or that your legs are moving, while you are standing still. That feeling has warned us that there are still tremors taking place. Before we start working, we always work out escape routes in case another big tremor occurs. We’re happy that we’ve never needed to use them.

Searching the fine rubble is tiring work for the handlers and their dogs. After four hours, the groups have to be changed. Only dead people will be found and salvaged at the many passive alerts of the dogs. The group coming to take over the search will find more. Those two children in the back of a room, the old woman in the kitchen, the two people beside the stove and, under a slab of concrete, a whole family with four children. Too many to list.

The dogs are impressed, too. One dog went through a hole in a neighboring house and lay on the carpet, looking sad. The dog was called back and once again encouraged to search. Again, he went inside and lay down on the carpet, with the message “I can’t help it” in his eyes. Is the dog too tired to search? The handler also went through the hole. Under the carpet between the rubble, he found the dead and badly mutilated body of a twelve-year-old boy.

The shopping center of Leninakan has also been destroyed. It is a modern building with an aluminum front. At the entrance to the stairwell, about twenty-six feet (8 m) above the ground, the dogs stand stock-still and won’t walk further. We also smell the strong odor of dead bodies coming out of the rubble. This place later proved to be a mass grave for shoppers who were not able to reach the exit in time.

That night we go on a mission again to search in a dangerously leaning apartment building. We hear that there are still two people missing. In the cellar, however, we locate four dead bodies in one place. That same night we once again have an operation. Rescue people have seen moisture coming up out of the rubble and they think that somebody might be alive there. Our dogs search what they can, but they don’t identify anything but four places where dead people will be dug out. The dog that lay down on the carpet in the afternoon now indicates a dead person by lying down on a mattress.

The next days: In a collapsed hotel, the dogs, to our joy, locate a missing mother alive. The same happens with two people trapped in the cellar of an apartment building. But under an enormous block of houses, eleven dead bodies have been found and salvaged; in the textile factory our dogs locate victims in four places.

In the meantime, it is snowing heavily. In a few hours there are sixteen inches (40 cm) of snow. The rubble becomes dangerous to walk on. The dogs can locate odors under the snow, but in the rubble all holes and obstacles are covered with a blanket of snow now. The dogs make missteps frequently, as we all do, and we can continue our work only very slowly.

After consulting with the Austrian commander, we decide to search only in cases where people have heard knock signals and think that people may still be alive under the rubble. It is sad, but we can’t do otherwise. Besides, we know that with extreme cold, down to minus 13°F (–25°C), and now more than two weeks after the fatal earthquake, only a miracle can bring survivors. We are realistic enough. We go on a few more missions, but after that we’re finished. We can’t do more for the Armenians.