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Aubonrat Setnawet, an electrician\u2019s helper, was working with her husband on the 23rd floor of a new office tower on the northern edge of Bangkok moments before disaster struck.<\/p>\n
She needed to get some equipment, so she took the construction elevator to the ground floor. Suddenly, she felt the ground sway beneath her and, with two sharp cracking sounds, the unfinished building began to collapse.<\/p>\n
With her cellphone in hand, she ran to escape the falling debris as a huge dust cloud rose. She tried calling her husband, Nuguy Setnawet, an electrician, but her calls did not go through.<\/p>\n
Since then, she has remained at the site, watching quietly as rescuers search for survivors. The news has been grim. Eight bodies were recovered from the scene on Friday but only one on Saturday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cI am still here waiting, waiting for a miracle,\u201d Ms. Aubonrat said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
About 80 people believed to have been in the 30-story building at the time of the collapse remain unaccounted for.<\/p>\n
Rescuers using heavy equipment and canine search teams spotted only the one body during the search on Saturday. The pile of rubble \u2014 seven stories high \u2014 is so unstable that it took them hours to recover the body.<\/p>\n
That brought to 10 the number of known fatalities in Bangkok from the quake, including a crane operator who fell to his death from a different building under construction.<\/p>\n
The epicenter of the quake was more than 600 miles to the north near Mandalay, Myanmar\u2019s second largest city, where the devastation was far worse. More than 1,600 were reported dead and the number is expected to rise considerably.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
At the site of the collapsed Bangkok building, the search continued into the evening under bright lights. Heavy equipment operators moved large chunks of metal from the rubble in the hope of finding survivors.<\/p>\n
Hundreds of rescuers from the military, the police and volunteer groups helped with the search. Dozens of relatives and friends of the missing workers watched from behind a barrier.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
In addition to search dogs, rescue teams used heat sensors to try to detect people who were still alive.<\/p>\n
Periodically, all work stopped so the searchers could listen for the sounds of survivors. But by Saturday evening, they had not heard any cries of help from within the mountain of debris.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Piyalux Thinkaew, a rescuer from the Ruamkatanyu Foundation, said heavy equipment that arrived Saturday was being used to clear away large pieces of metal and concrete while workers tried carefully not to destabilize the mountain of debris.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is to open a path for us to be able to see underneath and check for any signs of life,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s a very difficult task and it\u2019s risky work for the rescuers as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Suchatvee Suwansawat, a professor of civil engineering at King Mongkut University and a former president of the Council of Engineers Thailand, said experts must determine whether the collapse was caused by a design flaw or a construction error.<\/p>\n
An unfinished building should be in no more danger of collapsing during an earthquake than a completed structure, he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cIt has to be 100 percent safe,\u201d he said. \u201cThere was something wrong. This is like the building exploded. It\u2019s not normal.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
He said Thailand had never experienced the collapse of a building this size. Previously, he said, two six-story buildings collapsed, one in 2014 and one in 1993.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe really have no experience with this,\u201d he said. \u201cWe cannot say much yet because we have to look at the calculations and collect samples and evidence. Everything collapsed at the same time. And from the video, we saw the columns burst.\u201d<\/p>\n
The building was to be an officer tower for Bangkok\u2019s auditor-general.<\/p>\n
A Chinese state-owned company, the China Railway 10th Engineering Group, was part of a consortium awarded the contract to build the high-rise, according to an article in the People\u2019s Daily, the Chinese Communist Party\u2019s mouthpiece, that was published in 2021. The consortium also included a Bangkok-based builder, Italian-Thai Development Plc.<\/p>\n
Neither company could be immediately reached for comment.<\/p>\n
The project, which broke ground in April 2021, was one of the tallest buildings China Railway 10th Engineering Group had constructed, the People\u2019s Daily said at the time.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
The company is a subsidiary of a state-owned giant, China Railway Group, which is heavily involved in China\u2019s Belt and Road Initiative, a global infrastructure project intended to deepen China\u2019s supply chain networks and expand the country\u2019s influence.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Among those waiting at the site for word of their missing relatives was Saifon Thongsuk, 36, whose aunt and uncle and two adult children were all working on the office tower.<\/p>\n
They had been working at a different construction project on Bangkok\u2019s outskirts but had recently been sent to the site because of an urgent need for workers, she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know how long they had been working here,\u201d she said. \u201cI only know they were working on the top floor.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Naruemol Thonglek, 44, came to the site seeking word of six people including her husband, his son and four co-workers.<\/p>\n
Ms. Naruemol had been working at the site, too, until recently, but quit because her husband worried that it was leaving her too exhausted.<\/p>\n
\u201cI rushed here as soon as I heard about the earthquake,\u201d she said. \u201cI tried to get hold of him. Messages were not delivered. Calls were not connected. I cannot contact any of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
She continued, \u201cI guess he is in the middle of that pile of rubble. Maybe there\u2019s some space for air, I don\u2019t know. I can only hope for miracles.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thurian Pheungrod, 47, also hurried to the site on Friday after learning that his brother and sister-in-law were buried in the collapsed building. They had been working at the site for several months.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cAt first, I still believed there could be a miracle,\u201d he said. \u201cI still had hope. But I don\u2019t hope for miracles anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Berry Wang and David Pierson contributed reporting from Hong Kong.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n