Hero of the quake

But nothing prepared him for the range of gruesome sights he experienced as he helped with the rescue operation following the Indian earthquake.

Mr Parkinson has just returned to Sussex after a mercy mission to the devastated northern Gujarat province.

He thought he would be killed as he helped to save a 13-year-old boy from beneath 20 feet of rubble and saw line after line of crushed houses and shops.

But during his ten-hour coach journey from the city of Ahmedabad towards the epicentre of the quake, he noticed an ever-increasing trail of destruction.

Despite the intense training he had received, the 34-year-old fire brigade Sub Officer, who works at Preston Circus in Brighton, could not have been prepared for the scenes he faced during his week-long rescue mission.

He said: "Ahmedabad did not look too bad, but as we travelled south we noticed small groups of houses had been damaged and bridges had collapsed.

"We kept having to check that the bridges were safe to cross. Eventually we came across total devastation. It was unbelievable."

Mr Parkinson travelled with Rapid UK, a charity which sends volunteers to areas of natural disaster. It was his first mission since he signed up with the volunteer search and rescue force 18 months ago.

He said: "There was a very rigorous selection process and the training took about a year. But the training could have had no bearing on what we experienced in India."

He and his team spent a week searching for survivors in Bhuj, the closest industrial and urban centre to the epicentre of the earthquake.

When they arrived, Mr Parkinson and his team of 12 found the old part of the city entirely flattened, while only 30 per cent of the new part of Bhuj remained unaffected by the blast.

The quake was the largest in India for 50 years, measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale, and may have left more than 100,000 people dead.

Mr Parkinson said: "It was difficult to take it in. There were masses of bodies being burned, because they cremate the dead there. At least half of the population had been killed and all the survivors were displaced and homeless.

"Every building had suffered some sort of damage. Every one had collapsed in some way, shape or form."

After the earthquake, which affected an area the size of the British Isles last Friday, there was a lot of aftershocks.

During the rescue of the boy Mr Parkinson and two others from his team experienced a minor quake.

They had just come across the bodies of the boy's mother and his younger brother and had picked up a scratching noise with special sound equipment.

Mr Parkinson said: "The boy, whose name was Parth, was 20 feet down and was surrounded by plastic garden furniture which was protecting him.

"But when we got near to him there was a large aftershock that cracked the tunnel. We were in too far to dash out so we just held our breath.

"Afterwards we went back to the start of the tunnel and it had started to cave in. We put up some props but the area where we had been digging to find Parth had collapsed by eight inches.

"Eventually, when we got to him, he was semi-conscious. We got him to the surface and he was stabilised by doctors. He had been down there for more than 90 hours so it was incredible that he had survived."

Parth was taken to a military hospital in Bombay where he had to have his leg amputated from the knee down. He was then transferred to hospital in Bombay for specialist care.

Mr Parkinson, who is the fund-raising officer for Rapid UK, has been trying to find sponsors to pay for a replacement leg for Parth every six months until he stops growing.

He said: "I hope to go back to do relief work in India and I would like to meet him again."

Mr Parkinson's team also worked with the International Rescue Corps and together they saved nine people.

Rapid UK need help replacing equipment, including their fibre-optic camera which was damaged during the rescue mission.

They would also like companies to donate small laptop computers to help them relay information.

To make a donation call Mr Parkinson on 07971 976 177 or email him at geoff.parkinson@btinternet.com