PISCO, Peru — Carlos Ayo was given a single day to hope.
Perhaps, he told himself, his 16-year-old daughter, Carla, wasn't inside her dance academy when Peru's largest quake in almost four decades began shaking this coastal community. Maybe the girl had escaped the broken building and was looking for her parents, knowing they'd be desperate. Searching for her.
Then Carla's body was found and another name was added to a death list that numbers more than 540 throughout this quake-fractured region.
"My daughter was practicing a folkloric dance when the earthquake happened," Ayo told a reporter in a whisper. Then the father shook his inquisitor's hand, turned away and sat beside a group of others who had lost much.
More than a week has passed since the magnitude-8 tremor shook much of Peru. But communities located south of Lima such as Pisco, Ica and Chincha have been forever changed. Even sections of the famed Pan American Highway that runs along South America's west coast now carry deep, dangerous scars.
Indeed, a walk through seismic-weary Pisco today is to encounter a lunar ghost town. Few of the surviving structures are occupied, and the dust that was created when most of this fishing town's buildings were destroyed has now settled, leaving several inches of fine powder on roads and puffing up like moon dust when disturbed. Many residents wander about in surgical masks to protect themselves from the grimy air.
Looting was a problem in the hours following the Aug. 15 temblor, so Peruvian soldiers were dispatched to patrol Pisco's streets and corners with automatic weapons. Now the town seems silent and uneasily still beyond the perpetual, mechanical rumble and scrape of heavy equipment cleaning up the rubble.
The town's central plaza still remains a gathering place. But the familiar vendors hawking glass-bottled Cokes and lottery tickets can't be found. Instead, people line up in front of government tents where the names and identifying traits of "desaparecidos" — the missing — are recorded. A banner with the words "Pisco — Solo Hay Uno" (There's Only One Pisco) is stretched between treetops at one corner of the plaza, suggesting a town with grit. But below on ground level, a large grease board announces grim municipal statistics: 357 cadavers identified; one unidentified cadaver; 44 missing.
Several miles north in the small community of Grocio Prado, Eleazar Audencio invites visitors into his damaged adobe home with red-rimmed eyes and a smile. Audencio and many of his neighboring relatives are among the thousands of Peru's recent homeless. "We can't sleep in our houses, so we sleep outside in tents, " he said.
Both Audencio's adult niece and his 9-year-old nephew are nursing legs that were broken by falling walls and adobe. He hopes medicine will arrive to cure the neighbor children's chest colds. He worries the cuts on the heads and faces of some of his friends might become infected.
But Audencio said he has much to be grateful for. No one from his tight-knit church congregation was killed in the quake. "And we are all eating."
Others say they are not so lucky. Dozens of people line the sides of the Pan American Highway near Pisco, raising cardboard signs that beg for help and food from passing motorists.
The compact grounds of one LDS meetinghouse north of Pisco have become a tent city for 184 people. Many are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Others are not. All have lost their homes to the quake. Reymundo Saiigo Tinco reluctantly spoke of the night the quake arrived and the enhanced panic many felt believing a tsunami would soon follow. He wants to hope for better days but admits to seeing things in the quake's aftermath that have left him scarred.
The people here do what they can to counter the mix of boredom and desperation that might be found in a traditional refugee camp. Each day, a schedule is created at the encampment that includes time for family and quiet study, LDS-themed films, meal preparation, recreation for the kids and service projects. Older folks chat on the benches surrounding the chapel, while teenagers shoot hoops with a faded ball on the outdoor basketball court. Several portable toilets line the outside of the church property.
Help with a Utah tie arrived Thursday night when an LDS Church-sponsored charter plane landed at a Peruvian Air Force base outside of Pisco.
Church officials had hoped to deliver the 80 tons of food, medical supplies and other essential provisions days earlier, but mechanical problems on the chartered aircraft delayed delivery. Still, the cargo will benefit thousands needing supplies and sustenance.
At the same moment the LDS cargo plane was touching down on Peruvian soil, Elder Russell M. Nelson of the church's Quorum of the Twelve was in Lima offering counsel to stake presidents and other local LDS leaders. On Friday, Elder Nelson met with church employees in Peru, telling them that the huge shipment of supplies will bless lives, "but this is just the beginning of the help that will be needed."
He added the church will be helping earthquake victims in Peru long after the last box from Thursday's cargo shipment had been delivered.
The church does not have endless resources, but assistance will continue.
"The hearts of members want to help. They will give money and go without food in order to make things available for the people of Peru," Elder Nelson said.
Government and church officials are already focusing on the long-term challenges facing earthquake victims. Besides finding suitable housing, many will be looking for work. It's unknown when schools will open. But amid the desperation and grief here were glimpses of resiliency. Late Thursday, a group of Pisco boys cleared an area of rubble and played a haphazard game of soccer. They jostled for the ball and cheered each others feints and moves.
E-mail: jswensen@desnews.com