**Rescuers had given up searching for survivors from the collapsed Building 10 days ago.
The first sign of survival came when recovery workers heard an iron rod strike the massive rubble of the nine-story building outside the capital of Bangladesh, a fire service official told reporters at the site.
"I'm alive!" a woman said as workers approached the basement 17 days after the building had collapsed and 10 days since rescuers had given up searching for survivors. "Please rescue me."
That account came from Capt. Ibrahim Islam, a Bangladeshi military official outside the recovery operation.
Rescue worker Mohammad Rubel Rana offered a slightly different description of the discovery Friday. "When I was cutting iron rods, suddenly I found a silver-colored stick just moving from a hole, and I looked through and I saw someone calling, 'Please save me,' " he told Reuters.
"Then instantly I called the army and firefighters and said, 'Please look, I heard a sound.' Then they saw her and confirmed that there was a woman."
"I told her, mother, don't be afraid, we are here to rescue you," Lt. Col. Moazzem Hossain said, according to Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha (BSS), the state-run news agency. "Would you like to drink water?"
The use of heavy machinery was ordered stopped and, as onlookers crowded onto the site, rescuers worked for about an hour before pulling the garment worker free. She was crying, then stopped.
At 4:26 p.m., army engineers extricated the woman, whom authorities identified only as Reshma, 19, as hundreds of onlookers erupted in cheers.
After being given water and biscuits, Reshma was placed on a stretcher, put into an ambulance.
Over 1000 people lost their lives when that building collapsed.
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