Amid The Bustle Of Rescue Are Quiet Scenes Of Grief

For two days, the team of Self-Defense Force soldiers in khaki fatigues and helmets had clawed away at the debris of the collapsed home. Underneath, an elderly woman with heart disease lay buried.

When they finally pulled her out midmorning Wednesday in this earthquake disaster area on the outskirts of Kobe, the soldiers covered her body with a blanket. To the small group of anxious families and friends gathered at the scene, the meaning was clear: The rescue was too late.

The soldiers placed their hands together and bowed as the driver of the Self-Defense Force vehicle bearing the body drove away.

Yasuko Tsunemine, the woman’s daughter, tearfully approached the soldiers. “I’m sorry for the trouble,” she said, her face lined with grief. “Thank you very much.”

Gathering their picks and shovels, their ropes and saws, the team moved on. As Japan reeled under the effects of its worst earthquake in nearly 70 years, there was still another site, another rescue, another triumph or tragedy awaiting the solders.

Similar human dramas played out in Kobe as well, where Mitsuro Ohashi, 22, spent Wednesday night in his car outside his house despite temperatures in the low 30s and a badly cut hand. He had tried to pull his mother’s body from the rubble, but she was too tightly pinned.

“Someone had to look after mother,” he said, pale and expressionless. His father - with a broken leg - and brother and sister went in search of medical care.

As daylight broke on the disaster’s second day, there was a visible boost in regionwide rescue efforts. Teams of soldiers in green dress, police in blue uniforms and firefighters in red fanned out, armed with digging tools and walkie-talkies, to try to extract the hundreds of people still believed trapped. Sgt. Ryuji Kitamura said virtually all 2,500 SDF troops based in nearby Itami and Senzo had been mobilized for disaster efforts in 800 different areas.

Most of the teams are focusing on recovery efforts at smaller homes, where they more easily can dig through the wreckage with hand-held tools.

But at one site, several soldiers sat idle. Around them, the personal mementos of an anonymous family lay scattered in the parking lot: Godzilla videos, books on the game of Go, a Japanese doll and samurai helmet, rice bowls, slippers, a single red apple.

The soldiers knew a body was crushed under the second floor, but the wreckage was too heavy to remove without a crane. “We can’t do anything with our hands,” one said.