The first snow of the bitter Himalayan winter is devastating for the earthquake survivors, reports Ramita Navai in Kashmir
Huddled around a small fire in the crumbling ruins of a collapsed house, a dozen children warm their hands, rubbing them together above the flames. Their hunched shoulders and small bodies shiver as the incessant rain pelts down around them.
"It's cold. Very, very cold," says 15-year old Ranaha Afaq, pulling her red shawl around her. Her little brother's eyes stream as the black smoke from the burning wood billows across him, but he just squeezes them shut - he cannot afford to lose his spot.
The earthquake last October, which killed more than 86,000 and left 3.5 million people without shelter, buried the children's clothes. Now most of them trudge over the muddy, wet land without socks and shoes, their feet numb on the frosty ground.
The massive earth roofs of the traditional timber and mud "kacha" houses in the tiny village of Hariyola collapsed within seconds of the quake, crushing everything beneath them. The tumbled wreckage is the only refuge the villagers have against the rain and they crouch among the debris and mounds of rubble, engulfed by a thick fog as clouds of white mist shroud the village.
An old man stoops under a fallen sheet of corrugated iron, which vibrates with a thunderous rattle under the force of the deluge. A coarse, grey Kashmiri blanket is wrapped around his frail body but his cotton trousers are sodden and they cling to his bony, emaciated legs.
The weather has finally turned in earthquake-ravaged Kashmir and the bitter Himalayan winter is steadily unfolding in an onslaught of rain, snow and icy winds. For the survivors still without shelter, the effects are devastating.
Pneumonia has claimed its first victims and in this village, Ranaha's four-month-old baby sister was the first to succumb. "It was just too cold for her. She died last night," Ranaha says.
Until the arrival of Dr Ehtisham Ulhaq, medical aid had not reached the village. Working with the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), Dr Ulhaq came to Hariyola to make an assessment. "The situation is not good. It is getting colder and colder and already there are 25 children suffering from pneumonia and diarrhoea," says Dr Ulhaq. If they aren't treated, the children will die.
Hariyola trickles down the side of a mountain thick with pine forests, threading its way between steep, green terraces and apricot and apple trees. There is no road into the village, only a rocky dirt track that the rain has transformed into a river of sticky, brown mud. Flat land is a rare commodity in this mountainous region and there is no place for a helicopter to land. "We are alone. No one has come to help us," says Ranaha.
The earthquake buried the food stocks the villagers had managed to harvest in time for winter. Livestock that survived the quake escaped, with goats, sheep and prized buffalo - a vital source of income and nutrition - trampling and destroying the wheat and maize fields.
With hundreds of villages hidden and isolated in deep, remote valleys and high mountains, access has been a major problem for aid agencies.
In less than two weeks more than 4ft of snow will cut Hariyola off from the outside world. The villagers will be forced to hike five hours through the snow to Chattar Kalas, the nearest town. From there they will have to brave a perilous bus journey along sleety mountain roads to Muzaffarabad, the administrative centre of Pakistani Kashmir and the hub for aid.
The weather has already cost the relief operations precious days, with scores of helicopters carrying relief goods being cancelled. "Bad weather means no flights," says Walid Ibrahim, a logistics officer with the UN World Food Programme. "We lost a day and a half of deliveries due to bad weather. That's over 30 flights on an average day cancelled, which is food for 4,500 people for a month."
When the earthquake rippled through the earth it carved out deep, gaping cracks. And where fault lines run through mountains the sheer force of the quake literally split them in two, sending whole flanks crashing down and triggering hundreds of landslides. More than 1,000 people are still buried beneath them. The onset of rain has precipitated a new glut of landslides and road travel is a treacherous option.
"Now the rains have started we're facing problems with our commercial transporters as the roads are very dangerous and they are not always willing to travel," says Ibrahim.
Huge slabs of rock jut out from the soaked, loose earth, hanging precariously over travellers and the butchered remains of cars that litter the narrow, winding roads. Already several labourers have been killed clearing the worst affected areas. All that remains are the skeletal shells of the crumpled yellow Caterpillar trucks that have been hurled into the river below.
The Pakistani military has closed the most dangerous routes for repair but for many desperate survivors these roads are their only route to help. Risking their lives, they slip through the blockades, scrambling across the disintegrating mountains, lugging tents and blankets on their backs. Boulders bounce down around them as they dodge the showers of rocks that rain from above.
And with the rains and landslides comes the risk of flooding. Parts of more than a dozen villages are at risk of being wiped out and must be evacuated.
Nobody knows how many survivors are still without shelter, and aid agencies discover villages every day that have not yet received aid.
More than 410,000 tents have been distributed by aid organisations and the Pakistani military, but most of these are useless against freezing winter conditions.
"The tents that were first provided are summer tents and were only a stopgap measure. Eighty-five per cent of them are not winterised," says Darren Boisvert, media and public information officer for IOM, which is distributing shelter kits, enabling survivors to build a makeshift room out of the ruins of their homes.
Winterised tents are expensive, difficult to procure and must be shipped in to Pakistan. All of which means that unless survivors are given adequate shelter within the next two weeks, Pakistan will be facing another catastrophe.
"All we need now is somewhere warm to sleep," says Ranaha. The children around her nod, and then her little brother shyly whispers his first sentence. "We just want to be warm."