'I told quake children, look for light, light means hope'

A primary school teacher who lost nine of her pupils in Thursday's earthquake told yesterday how she tried to encourage them as she lay trapped for four hours under the rubble of the three-storey school building.

Twenty-six children and three adults died in the quake and rescuers were last night working to extract a last body, that of a female teacher, from the ruins.

At 4am yesterday, an eight-year-old boy was rescued, the 35th child to be saved.

Clementina Simone, 45, said that before the tragedy she had not been unduly worried by the previous night's two minor tremors, but had told the caretakers to keep the fire doors open and she had read a poster on what to do in an earthquake to her pupils before the classes began.

But as the quake struck, "we didn't even have time to stand up", she said. "The floor opened up and the walls started to crumble in the space of three seconds."

Ms Simone said she found herself trapped between her desk and chair, with a child's head wedged against her chest. "My head wasn't completely covered and I could see this stone hanging over me like a sword of Damocles."

She said the children remained calm and she encouraged them to seek shelter under their desks, covering their mouths with their jacket collars. "I told them to look for chinks of light, because light meant air and hope," she told reporters in the stricken hilltop village in the economically disadvantaged south-eastern region of Molise.

"My greatest fear was that there were some voices that I hadn't heard from the beginning," she added. "Now we have nine angels in paradise; we have lost everything."

The mayor of San Giuliano, Antonio Borelli, who lost a six-year-old daughter in the tragedy, was yesterday under fire for allowing allegedly dangerous modifications to the building in the past two years, and for failing to close the school after the two initial tremors. There was confusion over allegations that the parish priest, Ulisse Marinelli, had appealed to the local authorities to keep the school closed.

But the greatest anger was focused on restoration work to add a new storey to the building - for use as multimedia rooms - and a heavy reinforced concrete roof.

"The old and supposedly unsafe building is still standing and this brand new one has come down, burying our children," said a local resident, Luigi Persichello.

San Giuliano was struck by a strong aftershock at 4.15pm yesterday, measuring 5.3 on the Richter scale, which sent terrified residents running to safety and threw clouds of dust into the air. The tremor was accompanied by a roar, which caused particular anxiety in the village's sports centre, where relatives were keeping vigil by their children's open coffins.

Many mourners ran for safety, while elderly relatives, unable to move unaided, cried out for help.

Last night the civil protection authorities ordered the total evacuation of the severely damaged village. Volunteers and rescue workers have set up tents to house some 3,000 people made homeless.