Families desperate for news on search at hotel

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Their nights are sleepless and their days are spent verifying whether search teams are still digging at the dusty pile of wreckage once known as the Hotel Montana.

More than a week after the earthquake hit Haiti, families of at least 11 Canadians missing in the collapse of Port-au-Prince's top hotel are clinging to the hope that a miraculous rescue could still happen.

Many have been left in the dark, having no friends or co-workers at the scene to gather information, exhort rescuers or identify survivors and victims.

They have attempted to contact the international rescue teams at the Montana. They have broadcast their loved ones' room numbers and physical descriptions in the hope such tidbits could be useful to searchers.

"We're still hopeful. We need to keep the pressure on to keep the rescue going," said Chris Ludwig, an Ottawa environmental engineer whose co-worker, Katie Hadley, 31, had just checked in to the Montana when disaster struck.

"We're looking for some more leadership from our own government, and some more attention to that hotel than what we've got so far."

Reporters who have been to the hotel, in a leafy part of the Pétionville heights, say that its five storeys have flattened into a great pile, with the roof's remains forming a dome over the debris.

It was the misfortune of several Canadian travellers to be on board Air Canada Flight 950, the airline's weekly Montreal-Port-au-Prince run, which landed at 2:30 p.m. local time on Tuesday. That left them just enough time to clear customs and arrive at the Montana before the quake.

Martin Turgeon, president of Montreal information technology company ADNM International Inc., was on the flight with employee Alexandre Bitton.

The two arrived at the hotel at 4 p.m. and got in line to check in. Two women - believed to be Quebec civil servants Anne Chabot and Anne Labelle, who are missing - were ahead of them.

After getting his room key, Mr. Turgeon asked Mr. Bitton to meet him for a drink.

Mr. Turgeon was entering the bar at 4:53 p.m. when the earth began to move. He had just enough time to take five steps back to avoid being crushed by a concrete slab. "It was a matter of seconds. If I had been seated at the bar I would never have had time to get out."

Mr. Bitton, who was still checking in when the quake struck, is missing.

In addition to Mr. Bitton, Ms. Hadley, Ms. Chabot and Ms. Labelle, the missing Canadians who checked in on that day include school consultant Claude Chamberland and his spouse, Paquerette Tremblay, health-administration professor Roger Gosselin, former Liberal MP Serge Marcil and management consultant Boucif Belhachemi.

Mr. Belhachemi's daughter, Meryem, said she reported his disappearance, but hasn't heard anything from the government. "There's no news," she said. "We would have preferred to know if there's any search at the Montana."

Mr. Ludwig said Ms. Hadley's mother is devastated by the uncertainty about her daughter. "She doesn't sleep. She's very anxious. Just having no news, it's very hard."

Seven search-and-rescue teams were active at the site yesterday afternoon, according to Lynn University, a Florida school with students and faculty missing at the Montana.