By Adrian Bathgate
CHRISTCHURCH (Reuters) - Violent aftershocks hampered desperate efforts to find survivors in the quake-ravaged New Zealand city of Christchurch on Saturday as the death toll climbed to 123 and the local mayor called for patience after frustration among residents began to boil over.
Rescue teams from New Zealand and six countries, including the United States, China, Japan and Australia, scoured the rubble of levelled buildings in the central city and suburban areas hardest hit by Tuesday's 6.3 tremor -- but found only bodies.
"It's a sad morning with the confirmed death toll now up to 123 people," local mayor Bob Parker told reporters.
"To our people in Christchurch, around New Zealand and around the world ... you need to steel yourselves for these numbers to increase probably, in the days ahead."
The dead include people from 20 nations, including dozens of students from Japan, China, India and Taiwan who were in Christchurch, one of New Zealand's most attractive cities, to learn English in view of the country's dramatic southern Alps.
Hopes of finding people alive five days after the quake were dampened by aftershocks of up to magnitude 4.4 which brought down masonry and sent rescue teams scrambling for safety.
No further survivors have been found since a woman was rescued mid-afternoon on Wednesday.
Police Superintendent Russell Gibson said international rescuers believed survivors could still be found in rubble nearly four days after the quake hit.
"They have found people days later in places like Mexico. New Zealand deserves a couple of miracles here," he said.
Earthquake recovery minister Gerry Brownlee, who inspected the ruined city with Prime Minister John Key, said preparations for rebuilding whole sections of the central financial district were already underway.
"When we do rebuild the type of building will have to pass an economic test for future use and it will have to meet pretty stringent (building) code requirements," Brownlee said.
"That doesn't deter us from doing that. The prospects for this city are quite bright. There are not many other cities that get to completely rebuild."
Early estimates of insurance losses have ranged from $3 billion to $12 billion, and Key has said the country's Earthquake Commission (EQC) disaster fund stood at about NZ$6 billion before the quake, with reinsurance in place.
The number of missing was still reported at more than 200, but police have said it is likely that the number includes recovered bodies that have yet to be identified.
Parker said he had started to see a shift in mood among residents most affected by ongoing water and power problems in suburban areas nearest to the quake epicentre, where hundreds of homes will have to be demolished.
"Everybody is on deck, all hands are on the pump, but we do need you to understand the scale of what's in front of us at the moment is immense," he said, calling for calm. "This is not a Saturday for us, it's another day of our immediate response."
In the central city, the search has concentrated on a finance company office block, the city's landmark cathedral and a local television building, which housed an English language school, but aftershocks were hampering efforts.
"Work did have to stop there temporarily during the period of falling masonry," said police commander Dave Cliff.
More than half of the dead have come from the ruins of the Canterbury Television (CTV) building. About 65 people, including many missing Japanese and Chinese students, are believed to be inside, caught as floors pancaked onto one another.
More than 600 rescue workers scoured the city and hardest-hit suburbs, where broken water and sewage pipes, toppled power lines and ruptured gas mains have made large areas uninhabitable, forcing thousands to flee.
Parker, the local mayor, said more than 340 houses in the city's eastern suburbs, had been marked with red tape for demolition, while around 40 percent of buildings in the city centre were unsafe to enter.
Thousands of volunteers from unaffected parts of the city or nearby towns converged on the worst-affected areas. They shovelled sun-baked, grey sand contaminated with sewage and debris into metre-high piles for removal.
Christchurch is built on shaky foundations of sand, silt and subterranean water which all churned together during the quake.
"We got off lightly. What can we do but help folk like us who didn't fare so well?" said Ngaire Smith.
Ratings agency Standard & Poor's backed New Zealand's ability to withstand the massive economic impact of the quake, saying the country's AA+ foreign rating was secure, albeit with an existing negative outlook.
(Writing by Rob Taylor and Gyles Beckford; Editing by Sugita Katyal)
