Inside lie rows of makeshift cots full of the wounded and the recovering, and Alix marches down one.

The wrecked church was an impromptu hospital beneath whose shattered roof dozens of these men lay helpless on makeshift cots.

In Silverdale they were herded into a school with makeshift cots, but by then they were fewer than a dozen.

Cao Bangying, 36, whose family had set up mattresses and makeshift cots under a dump truck, said her house had been destroyed.