Thousands of Haitians are spending a second night in the open after the country’s catastrophic earthquake which may have killed up to a hundred thousand.
Haitian Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive told CNN and Reuters that the death toll could top 100,000.
Medical aid agency Medecins sans Frontieres reported a “massive influx” of casualties at its makeshift clinics, many of them with severe injuries.
The search for survivors under the rubble went on after darkness. Haitians tried digging through rubble with their bare hands to rescue people trapped after the biggest earthquake to hit the impoverished Caribbean nation in two centuries. Thousands of buildings from shanties to the presidential palace were destroyed, streets were blocked by debris and telephone service was knocked out. Countries around the world, meanwhile, scrambled to send in help.
See birds the eye view of Haiti earthquake aftermath
[media id=99 width=610 height=340]Substantial foreign aid for the three million people said to be in need is due to begin arriving within hours.
The first US aid planes have already landed at the airport serving the capital, Port-au-Prince, and US naval ships are on the way.
EU states, Russia and China are among those sending rescue and medical teams by plane while pledges of aid have been made by countries around Latin America.
UN peacekeepers, who played a key role in maintaining public order in Haiti even before the quake, have been deployed to control any outbreaks of unrest as reports come in of looting.
The 7.0-magnitude quake, Haiti’s worst in two centuries, struck at 1653 local time (2153 GMT) on Tuesday, just 15km (10 miles) south-west of Port-au-Prince and close to the surface.
Thousands of Haitians gathered in open spaces overnight in the capital on Wednesday, too scared to sleep inside damaged buildings. Many sang hymns to keep up their spirits.
One of MSF’s emergency medical facilities collapsed during the quake while the other two were so badly damaged they became unusable, he said.
At least 1,000 people have sought help at three temporary MSF sites, including some 50 people who were treated for burns caused by domestic gas containers exploding in collapsing buildings.
In the main Haitian community in the US, Miami’s Little Haiti, people have been meeting to pray and to raise money for relief efforts.
With many of Haiti’s communication lines down, Haitians living abroad have been battling to get through to relatives.
Among those who lost their home was the Haitian President René Préval, who told CNN that he didn’t yet know where he would spend the night.
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