China floods: 3-month-old baby rescued from debris after more than 24 hours, mother dies

She was crying aloud when the rescuers arrived.

Zhangxin Zheng | July 23, 2021, 04:24 PM

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Parts of China's Henan province have been devastated by floods caused by an unprecedented once-in-1,000 years heavy rain.

Local media reported that meteorologists recorded 201.9mm of rain in an hour.

That amount of rain in an hour surpassed the record rainfall in 24 hours in western Germany last week, where close to 200 people were killed by weather-induced floods.

Caught off guard, some Chinese residents were trapped in transport and collapsed buildings.

Rescue efforts are ongoing.

Three-month-old rescued

The torrential rain and rapid waters led to a mud flow at one village in Henan.

A three-month-old baby girl was stuck in the collapsed house for almost 24 hours.

On July 20, a video circulated on social media informing the public that the mother and daughter were trapped in the debris after the house gave way, according to a local news report.

Rescuers were alerted and by around 5pm the next day, the infant was found but her mother remained missing.

According to the report, the infant was crying loudly when the rescuers arrived. The entire rescue process took about half an hour.

It was believed that the mother had placed the baby girl on a relatively safe and high area when the house collapsed so that her daughter had a higher chance of survival.

The baby girl was then confirmed to be healthy and she was handed over to her father subsequently.

via Weibo.

Mother died from the disaster

After the baby girl was found, the rescuers continued to search for the mother for over an hour.

However, they did not have sufficiently large rescue machines and decided to stop the search in order to save lives in other areas in need.

It was reported that the mother's body was found on July 22 afternoon.

Sadly, the mother did not survive.

Top image via Douyin screen grab