Yang Jianbo and Chen Xiaolin scour printouts taped on a wall at a sports arena listing thousands of earthquake survivors who have been accounted for, then turn and walk slowly away.

The name of their cousin, Yang Gan, is not there.

The 32-year-old businessman had travelled to the Sichuan hill town of Beichuan on May 8 to buy chunks of mountain rock to be carved into statues or sliced into tablets.

"We talked to him the day before the earthquake, so he was definitely there," said Yang Jianbo.

As much as the devastating 7.9 magnitude earthquake in China's southwestern Sichuan province tore apart buildings, it has done the same to families. In the chaotic aftermath information has been hard to come by in the search for loved ones.

On Monday, the day of the quake, Yang Gan and six associates had lunch together at the Beichuan Hotel, where they were staying. That was the last anyone heard from him.

Three checked out after eating and left town. They were in the city of Mianyang when the earthquake struck, said Yang Jianbo. Yang Gan and the others are missing.

"We contacted China Mobile and they said his cell phone was in Beichuan, specifically the Beichuan Hotel," Yang Jianbo said.

As many as 25,000 refugees were encamped at the Jiuzhou Arena in the city of Mianyang, about an hour outside of hard hit Beichuan county, a police officer estimated, and more were coming out of the hills and destroyed towns.

The government is making an effort to account for everyone, but the task is daunting with nearly 5 million people displaced and the death toll, now around 29,000, expected to exceed 50,000. It will take months to sort through the damage.

Teams of volunteers passed through the crowd at the arena taking down names, ages and hometowns of survivors. At tables outside more volunteers sat by signs naming each town and village in the surrounding area for people from those places to register.

A broadcast station called out the names of people being sought by others, and local radio periodically announced a specific person was seeking another.

Pictures of missing family members or photocopies of their I.D. cards with a contact number were taped on walls and lamp posts at the arena.

"Wu Shiting, your wife is looking for you ...," read one.

BLEAK

Almost a week after the earthquake, some still hold vigil outside gates of schools or factories awaiting news.

Others traveled from afar to search. Chen Xiaolin flew in from Guangdong province near Hong Kong to find her cousin.

A few have been lucky.

Long Jinyu trekked from Guizhou province in the south to Yingxiu, a town near the epicentre that was flattened, to look for her 20-year-old son, Jiang Yuhang.

Five days after the earthquake, after travelling by car, motorcycle and on foot over cut off mountain roads, she watched rescuers pull her son alive from the wreckage of a six storey building, the Chengdu Commercial News reported on Sunday.

For most at this stage, though, the prospects of finding a wife, brother, mother or friend lost in the chaos appeared bleak with thousands of people still unaccounted for.

A flow of refugees approached the wall where the printout lists of survivors in hospital were posted.

Sisters Huang Jing and An Xiaorong took their turn, touching the paper with their fingers as they went meticulously down the long lists in search of the names of their 10-year-old daughters, Wei Shihan and Mao Yiying.

Wei was in third grade and had probably been in the second floor classroom of her school in the old part of Beichuan, her mother said; Mao was in the fourth grade and she too was likely in class on the second floor of a school across town.

Both schools and virtually every other building in Beichuan were destroyed by the quake.

"We have asked everyone we have seen who was there and everyone we know. We have been to all the hospitals. When we hear an ambulance go by we rush over to ask who's inside. We try to keep hope," said Huang, choking back tears.

"I doubt if there's any hope, though. The mountain came down and buried the school. I doubt her body will even be found."