U.S. Rescuers Find a Strong Spirit Among Quake’s Ruins

For Dr. Rosamaria Durazo, one of three UCLA physicians just back from Mexico City, the devastation of the once-great hospital where she trained and later lectured was almost beyond comprehension.

She said the words of her former colleagues, Dr. Guillermina Saavedra and Dr. Beatriz Ansura, told the story: “We lost everything. We don’t even have a hypodermic needle. We have nothing left.”

Saavedra is director of the obstetrics-gynecology department and Ansura director of pediatrics at the 2,200-bed Mexico City General Hospital.

“The General Hospital and the 1,500-bed Medical Center of the Social Security were the largest medical facilities, and they are both down,” the weary Durazo said. “They are both government hospitals, like the county hospital here, the places where the poor go.”

Durazo, assistant professor of anesthesiology, flew to Mexico City Wednesday with Dr. Jack Magit, clinical associate professor of anesthesiology, and Dr. Ronald Katz, chief of staff at UCLA Medical Center. They were on the first of the daily shuttle flights organized by industrialist Armand Hammer.

Hammer, chairman of the board of Occidental Petroleum, arranged for his corporate Boeing 727 and his smaller Gulfstream executive jet to carry medical supplies to the earthquake-stricken Mexican capital as long as the need continues.

The Occidental flights were part of a larger effort by Southern California companies and charitable agencies to provide supplies and personnel in the aftermath of the 8.1 quake that struck Sept. 19.

Jacki Hanson, a Mission Viejo nurse who flew with seven others from Liga International to Mexico City to give medical aid to the injured, said the earthquake victims were moved by the outpouring of assistance.

“The people were very grateful for our help. One woman had tears in her eyes,” Hanson said. Liga International, a medical assistance group that holds monthly clinics in the Mexican state of Sinaloa, delivered a planeload of cast and splint supplies, donated by the 3M Corp., to Mexico City. “But when we asked the people what they needed, we wound up giving our blankets away,” Hanson said.

The people also need flashlights and food that requires no cooking, she said. Water is at a premium, she added.

The Liga team included two doctors and two nurses who had hoped to treat the injured. But when they reported to Benito Juarez Hospital--where a 12-story building had collapsed--they were put “on call” to assist in case rescue workers unearthed large numbers of injured survivors from the rubble, she said. Because the rescuers found only a few survivors at a time, the Liga team wasn’t called on, Hanson said.

‘Tender Loving Care’

“So, effectively, I didn’t do very much technically as a nurse, but nursing involves a lot of TLC (tender loving care) and I did a lot of that,” she said.

She talked to one cabdriver who had intended to meet a friend at a hotel the morning of the earthquake, and he owed his life to a packed hotel parking lot, she said. Instead of quickly parking and going inside, he had to drive a distance to find a parking space, she said.

“That’s when it hit,” Hanson said. “He said it went on for seven minutes. He saw the hotel go down” and watched a plate of glass fall from above “and split a woman in half.”

The nurse said she admired the spirit of the earthquake survivors.

“I was impressed with the way they would line up (for water distribution),” she said. “There was no pushing, no shoving, no fighting. It was really remarkable. They stoically adjusted to living in these makeshift conditions. They really are very resilient. I was thinking, if it happened here, we’d be demanding this and demanding that. They (the Mexicans) say, ‘This is the way it is and we’ll cope with it as well as we can.’ ”

Devastation Is Noted

California volunteers described the city as devastated.

Magit, a veteran of World War II, said that what he saw in Mexico City was “visually much worse than anything I saw in Europe . . . and I worked in field hospitals in Cologne and London.”

“We were able to bring in supplies for anesthesiology, drugs of that nature, which were very desperately needed,” he said. “All of the instruments we brought in were being used right away.”

Frank Ashley, spokesman for Occidental, said his company sent tetanus vaccine for 20,000 people, while other firms donated catheters, cartons of sutures and 4,000 bottles of liquid baby formula that does not require water. He said Presbyterian Hospital in Whittier has offered 200 obstetrics beds, and he is trying to get air transport for them. “Women are giving birth and there are no beds,” Ashley said.

Ashley said the airlift is mainly carrying medical supplies and personnel. “We haven’t sent any toys, but I think it is a wonderful idea,” he said. “We’re trying to get life-saving equipment there now, but anytime we have room beyond immediate needs, we will try to send some toys.”

Off-Duty Assistance

Susana Oses of Hollywood, Cuban-born reservations manager for Mexicana Airlines at Los Angeles International Airport, headed a group of 10 employees who spent two days of their off-duty time delivering supplies to relief centers in and around Mexico City.

She said she also was concerned about the children. “They don’t have any toys,” Oses said, “and there is nothing like a toy to alleviate a child’s trauma.”

One of the most poignant encounters she recalled in Mexico City was with a mentally retarded child found wandering the streets. “He can talk,” she said, “but he can’t explain who he is or who his parents are or anything--if they died, I don’t know what they will do with him.”

The most vivid scene for Astrid Martinez of Hermosa Beach, another Mexicana employee, was at the site of an apartment building. “It had collapsed into crumbs, it was so crumpled,” she said. “We met this guy from Hollywood and he had come to pick up his wife and his mother-in-law. His wife is an American citizen, and he had gotten immigration papers to bring his mother-in-law here, and then the quake hit. We were there when the rescuers heard the family dog barking from inside--they went to rescue (the women) and they were already dead.”

Martinez said the Hollywood man wanted to arrange a funeral but Mexican officials wanted to haul the bodies away. “They are not identifying people now, they are putting the bodies into mass graves. . . . The American guy was in shock, could barely talk. Then all of a sudden he would pull himself together, and then break down,” Martinez said.

Oses said she saw the bodies of the mother and daughter.

“We lied,” Oses admitted. “We told the police we were from the international press and we would make a big scandal . . . so they said OK. There was an ambulance and they allowed the man to go with the bodies to a funeral home. . . . Finally, he started crying: ‘I’ll never forget, never forget what you’ve done.’ ”

Mexicana sales agent Luis Hernandez of Buena Park, who was born in Mexico City, said he had been to his hometown only three weeks before the quake. “Then I went back last Monday,” he said. “It was sad to see the city which I grew up in . . . Avenida Juarez and Avenida Reforma destroyed, like somebody dropped a bomb.”

‘Don’t Know Anything’

“My grandmother lives in Platelolco, close by,” Hernandez said. “It was blocked off by the Army. . . . My parents live 40 minutes outside the city and can’t communicate with her by phone. . . . They are kind of scared. My grandmother, Jacinta Zermeno, is 75, and we don’t know anything.”

He said he was scheduled to fly back to Mexico City on Saturday night, taking medicines, baby food and blankets . . . and chocolates, candy bars, toys. “You have to keep the kids doing something, and they need calories,” he said.

As for his grandmother, Hernandez said, “I will keep going back until I find something of her. I won’t leave until I know how she’s doing, how she’s faring. . . . I’m trying to think positive.”

Western Airlines also is airlifting equipment from LAX to Mexico City, most of it donated or loaned by Los Angeles city and county agencies. Among the gear were portable generators, a hydraulic jack, a tractor, 1,000 flashlights and 3,000 batteries. A spokesman for City Councilman Art Snyder said it is hoped that more heavy equipment can be flown in next week on an air freight Boeing 747, while lower-priority heavy equipment will be sent by train.

Medical Supplies Airlifted

Six Southern California Adventist hospitals have airlifted about 3,100 pounds of medical supplies valued at $20,000, with White Memorial Medical Center in Glendale coordinating the project.

While most aid from Southern California was going to Mexico City, Pasadena was directing its relief efforts toward a smaller city--Ciudad Guzman, with about 125,000 residents, located about 90 miles southwest of Guadalajara.

Mireya Asturias Jones, chairman of El Centro de Accion Central, which represents Pasadena’s Latino community, headed a delegation of 10 city officials and service officers. She said Saturday that because Ciudad Guzman suffered fewer casualties and less damage than Mexico City, the relief effort there will concentrate on people-to-people aid--cash donations to help rebuild individual homes.

Jones, a Guatemalan by birth, worked as a translator in her native country during the summer after the earthquake disaster of 1976.

She said that from her experience in Guatemala, the people “don’t need canned asparagus shipped from Pasadena, but rice and beans purchased locally.”

12 Churches Destroyed

She said 12 churches--”probably the only tall structures in the city”--were destroyed but that Ciudad Guzman’s six hospitals suffered only minor damage. Jones said she was told that 29 people died in the city and another 10 in the outlying districts.

“It is a proud and wonderful city,” she said. “I think what we will do is start a sort of adoption program. . . . It would cost $200 to $300 to rebuild an individual home.” She estimated that 600 homes were destroyed.

And, she said, “we learned a lot from Ciudad Guzman that would be useful if Pasadena were ever hit by an earthquake . . . the togetherness, the teamwork, was unbelievable.”

Jones said a news conference will be held this week to announce specific plans and goals for Pasadena’s relief effort, which she believes will take the form of a fund-raising drive.

Delivered Phone Message

Jones personally delivered a telephone message to one Southern Californian. She said she met Aurelia Gomez, 53, mother of Eddie Gomez of Anaheim, at one of the relief centers.

Aurelia Gomez, who had been in Ciudad Guzman since August to celebrate her mother’s 98th birthday, pitched in as a Red Cross volunteer to help rebuild the city of her birth.

Her son said he was delighted but not surprised to get word from his mother by way of Jones.

“I understand that she will be there another week or so,” Gomez said. “She feels a moral obligation to work with the Cruz Rojas.”

Times staff writer Gary Jarlson contributed to this story.