It was heartbreaking to read the story of the language students buried alive in the language school in Christchurch.

It is always terrible and I always grieve for their loss, but I found it even more poignant to learn that the buried girl had been texting from underneath the rubble to her family in the Philippines.

Nothing more from her now. Either she has died or her cellphone has run out of battery power. Or both.

How excruciating, how awful, for the family to receive such messages, for the young person to be able to say I'm buried alive, to be able to give her exact location, yet nobody could get to her.

I don't know which is worse, waiting and hoping with no word of information, or knowing what happened, getting text messages as your daughter dies alone in the dark, waiting for the rescue that doesn't come in time.