Bodies of people killed in yesterday's Christchurch earthquake are being moved to Burnham Military Camp as a temporary morgue in the city could not cope, Cabinet ministers were told at a briefing this morning. Department Prime Minister and Cabinet chief executive Maarten Weavers started briefing ministers at the start of theiremergency Cabinet meeting to discuss declaration of a national state of emergency while media were still present. ``Temporary mortuary facilities have been moved from Orchard Rd to Burnham, which is a capacity question,'' Mr Weavers said. ``Police are deploying a large disaster victim identification team domestically they've had offers from Australia as well for additional assistance.'' Earlier, Superintendant Russell Gibson said police had been forced to leave bodies on the streets to focus on rescuing survivors. There were 38 bodies in a temporary mortuary at Canterbury police station, Mr Gibson said. Mr Weavers told ministers that civil defence systems were working well and lessons had been learnt from the September quake. He outlined offers of international help many of which had been taken up. Two medical teams from Australia would arrive tomorrow. Christchurch Hospital was coping well with capacity and was on-sending patients to other facilities as required. Mr Weavers said schools would be used as distribution points for water.
