One man's thousand-mile journey to reach his family in Sichuan quake zone

Moments after the start of his daily grind as a construction worker in northern China, Xia Donghai’s world came crashing down with news that a terrifying earthquake had struck his hometown almost a thousand miles away.

With all communications down in Lushan county in the southwestern province of Sichuan, Xia’s only way of knowing if his family had survived was to set off on an epic journey that would deliver either relief or tragedy.

“I am filled with terror, I do not know what I will find when I return to the family home,” he told AFP, barging his way uninvited into one of the few cars to get through a police road-block on the edge of the disaster zone.

“I have no other way, I must continue my journey,” he added, shutting the door defiantly behind him and sitting on the lap of a back-seat passenger, still in his work clothes and safety helmet, and in need of a wash.

“I have tried to call my family hundreds of times but I get no response,” said the 48-year-old, frantic with worry in the hours after the disaster struck.

Xia is one of 230 million workers from China’s impoverished inland provinces who have left their families behind in search of a better wage in the booming coastal areas.