Hope has turned to anguish for the families of dozens of students missing at a collapsed Islamic boarding school, as Indonesian authorities announced Thursday they have found no further signs of life and are shifting their focus from rescue to recovery.

The painful decision came after thermal drones and sensitive equipment failed to detect any survivors in the rubble of the Al-Khoziny Islamic Boarding School, which crumbled on Monday while construction was underway on its fourth floor.

"The heavy equipment will be deployed soon to speed up the evacuation process," said Suharyanto, head of Indonesia’s National Disaster Management Agency, at a news conference. Until now, rescuers had used their hands and light tools, fearing that heavier machinery could harm anyone still trapped alive.

The announcement extinguished the fragile hopes that had been briefly fueled late Wednesday when five students were miraculously found alive in an air pocket within the wreckage. That hope grew increasingly faint as the critical 72-hour "golden window" for finding survivors closed on Thursday.

The news was devastating for family members who have kept a desperate vigil at the site since the collapse. Relatives collapsed in the streets, their wails of anguish echoing around the sealed-off disaster zone. The overwhelming smell of decomposing bodies hung heavy in the air hundreds of meters from the scene.

In a heart-wrenching procedural shift, families lined up at an on-site tent to provide DNA samples to help identify the remains of their loved ones. Officials believe 59 people, mostly students, are still missing beneath the debris.

The collapse has so far confirmed five fatalities and injured more than 100 people. The painstaking transition to recovery means the community now braces for the tragic task of retrieving the dead. (ILKHA)