Morocco earthquake survivors confront late rescuers

Residents of a village in the Atlas Mountains erupted in anger when the Moroccan government left them alone for three days to dig and bury their loved ones.

When the earth gripped his home and shook it late Friday night, Mohamed Abarada ran outside with his 9-month-old daughter in his arms. His mother, wife and 9-year-old daughter were still inside, trapped.

Mr. Abarada began digging with his bare hands. He dug during the day with the help of neighbors and relatives, and at night with the flashlight on his phone.

The two older women were removed lifeless, joining the list of dead in Douar Tnirt, a village of a few hundred inhabitants located at the end of a narrow and winding road in the Atlas Mountains.

But on Monday, his daughter Chaima was killed. yet to be found.

With Mr. Abarada's shoulder injured, his fellow researchers urged him to rest while they continued to search what had been his home - broken bricks mixed with broken wood, a bamboo roof, sofa cushions, a satellite dish and kettles, all the debris of family life. He ignored them. He had an idea exactly where Chaima was – on the stairs, trying to escape – and he and the others were working on the hole they had made with shovels, picks and their bare, inexperienced hands. /p>

All Monday, they worked under the setting sun, Mr. Abarada, his brothers and other neighbors. There was no rescuer in sight, no official, no one but them – and then no one but him. When the other villagers left for their lunch break, he stayed, throwing the debris from the hole log by log, emptying it of broken stones basket by basket.

ImageVillagers comforting each other on Monday.Credit...Sergey Ponomarev for The New York Times

The roosters crowed, however there was only him and a few others to hear. A little kitten scurried around his feet, meowing, and he chuckled. People from outside the village passed by, taking photos and shaking their heads, murmuring against the father's perseverance. He continued to work, his green T-shirt increasingly browned by dust.

“Poor guy,” said Fatema Benija, 32, whose house was opposite that of Mr. Abarada and who now spent his days in a van parked between the two piles of rubble. “For two days, no one came to see us. You have no idea what we went through. Hunger, cold. »

And then a complaint: “If only they had saved people sooner. »

This is not new for Douar Tnirt, villagers said. Medical care has long been distant, and even schooling is limited to one hour a day in the two-room primary school, the road being narrow and rocky.

The government, people said, barely seems to know they exist.

Then, around 4:45 p.m. On Monday, help finally seemed to arrive. People wearing boots and helmets walked the path leading to the collapsed house. There were members of the Moroccan government and a Spanish search and rescue team, accompanied by a journalist from 2M, the Moroccan public television channel.

Suddenly, Mr. Abarada's Lonely Man The piece of mud bricks resembled the earthquake rescue scene that audiences around the world are accustomed to seeing. There was a human chain of volunteers in fluorescent vests blocking spectators from the debris-strewn mountain, a dog trained to sniff out bodies, people in neat uniforms, looking serious and authoritarian.

Mr. Abarada stood aside from the debris, relegated in a matter of seconds to the status of a minor actor in his own drama.

But a lot of g. ..