GEORGE NEWS - It is a balmy winter's day and a construction worker returns from his lunch break, eager to add finishing touches to a newly built, five-storey apartment block in bustling downtown George.
At six minutes past two, just as Shadrack Maine enters the lift on the top floor, he is suddenly engulfed by a terrifying whooshing sound.
In just eight seconds, the entire building collapses catastrophically, instantly burying 62 victims beneath 6 000 tonnes of collapsed concrete and mangled steel.
Thus begins the nightmare experience for the Lesotho national, who had left his family in Maseru in 2010 to seek a living in South Africa.
On that fateful Monday, 6 May, four days before his 37th birthday, Maine is plunged into pitch-black darkness and a sheer living hell as his body is pinned down under massive cement blocks.
"I will never forget the terrible screams around me," says Maine about the trauma he endured while languishing for hours in the shadow of death. He drifted into semi-consciousness until the next day when he was located by rescuers.
His left arm and leg were amputated on site in order to free him from the wreckage.
It was while in George Hospital, that Shadrack was visited by the world's top deaf artist, Marnitz Steyn, with his Bible study group.
Read more on www.georgeherald.com
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