2 cars ahead of the Minagawa family escaped in nick of time.

NAGAOKA, Niigata Prefecture--The 2-year-old boy entombed for 92 hours before being ``miraculously'' rescued from an earthquake-triggered landslide here was not the only individual to have had the narrowest of escapes.

The drama occurred Oct. 23 after a section of Route 589 was engulfed by tons of rocks, rubble and dirt cascading down a mountainside.

Two vehicles were just meters ahead of Takako Minagawa, 39, who died along with her daughter, Mayu, 3, when the Oct. 23 landslide hit.

But her son, Yuta, 2, was found alive four days later.

Ayumi Kijima, a 36-year-old worker at a senior citizens home in Nagaoka, was heading home to Ojiya.

Just ahead of Miyagawa and behind Kijima was another car carrying a 58-year-old company employee and his wife, 51. The couple, who declined to be named, also narrowly escaped.

Police said the landslide that blocked that part of Route 589 was triggered by the main earthquake that struck at 5:56 p.m.

Kijima said her car swayed when the temblor hit and then her brakes failed.

``I thought, is it a punctured tire or a gust of wind?'' she said.

The car eventually stopped, straddling the road diagonally. The rear window was smashed and the door only opened about 20 centimeters.

Then came an aftershock and the thunderous sound of rocks tumbling down the mountainside.

Kijima tried calling for help on her mobile phone but there was no connection. The driver of a truck in front noticed her hazard lights flashing in his rearview mirror and turned back. He helped wrench her car door open.

``He said, `It's dangerous, we should run--the bridge ahead could collapse in the next aftershock,''' Kijima recounted.

She looked back for the first time after crossing a bridge leading to Ojiya. ``The mountainside was not its usual shape,'' she said.

Kijima then realized she was in a landslide. She said she began to shake.

The part of the road where her car stopped was torn away and engulfed by falling rocks.

Later, Kijima learned that Minagawa and her 3-year-old daughter had perished.

``My life was saved and I feel I must value it,'' she said.

The car carrying the mid-aged couple also narrowly escaped. It slid tens of meters down a slope with soil and rocks, stopping just at the edge of Shinanogawa river.

``It was probably about 10 seconds but it felt as if time was moving very slowly,'' the husband recalled. ``I didn't know what was happening.''

The car, partially buried in soil, was saved from rocks by a snowslide barrier on the mountainside.

Aftershocks rumbled intermittently. The couple climbed down to where a portion of the road was intact.

They saw people on the other side of the severed road, who in turn contacted rescue workers. They arrived about an hour later.

They signaled to rescuers by waving their lit mobile phones in big circles.

While grateful, they say their survival is bittersweet.

``When I think of the people who died, I can't just be happy about being saved myself,'' said the wife.

She said she clasps her palms together in a prayer each time she hears news about the earthquake toll.(IHT/Asahi: November 3,2004)