Rescue workers were stunned on Friday afternoon when a female garment worker was rescued alive from the rubble 17 days after the Rana Plaza building collapsed outside Dhaka, Bangladesh.

Reshma Begum, who identified herself as a seamstress who worked on the 3rd floor of Rana Plaza, had been breathing through a pipe from inside the wreckage, soldiers conducting the rescue operation said.

Abdur Razzaq, an army sergeant who helped to rescue Begum, said she had been hitting the concrete with the pipe and he had heard the sound after bulldozers had lifted loose rubble covering the spot.

“I heard the sound and rushed towards the spot. I knelt down and heard a faint voice. ‘Sir, please help me,’ she cried,” he said.

Begum told rescuers she was unhurt and had survived by scavenging for biscuits in the rucksacks of dead colleagues.

Begum’s body was covered in dust and her hair was completely white. A woman wailing near the wreckage said Reshma was her niece. “We’d only expected to see her body,” she cried.

As Begum was lifted from the rubble, crowds ringing the site broke into cheers of “God is great!” Rescue workers were seen wiping away tears.

Army officers co-ordinating the rescue expressed astonishment at finding a survivor in the rubble at a time when the operation was winding down.

“It is incredible that someone could have survived in the wreckage 408 hours after the building came down,” Lieutenant Shah Jamal said. “Her will to live is amazing. We’ve given her oxygen and she has been rushed to hospital.”

Army officials said the death toll had reached 1,050 on Friday afternoon.

Read more: UK Guardian