Earthquake rattles China, over 203 killed, 11,000 injured

[DKT27]

A 7.0-magnitude earthquake caused widespread destruction in southwest China's Sichuan province on Saturday with the official death toll creeping towards 160 until midnight. Government officials put the number of injured at 5,700, including nearly 500 victims in serious condition. The final toll is expected to be much higher, sources said.

The death toll in the quake, which struck at 8.02am Saturday, is expected to rise sharply because a large number of people are still caught in debris of fallen buildings and earth mounds caused by landslides. Rescuers have not reached a large number of the affected people in Lushan mountain range, which is 5,000 metres above sea level.

The affected area saw 42 after-shocks and several landslides that are believed to have killed and injured many people. Landslides have also damaged roads leading to the worst-affected towns of Baoxing, Taiping and Longmen, making it difficult for rescue teams to reach the trapped people.

The epicentre of Saturday's quake in Lushan country is 115km west of provincial capital Chengdu, and ran 12 kms below the earth's surface. The earthquake took place in the same region where a massive quake killed 95,000 people in 2008.

Broken electricity connections also hampered relief work. Only a few people had been pulled alive from the debris, and official television mainly focused on urban areas of Yaan in the quake-hit area without showing the villages in the mountainous areas. The weather bureau has forecast rain in Lushan county on Sunday, which will affect rescue efforts. "The current most urgent issue is grasping the first 24 hours since the quake's occurrence, the golden time for saving lives," Chinese premier Li Keqiang said after rushing to the affected Sichuan province.

"Under the strong leadership of the party and the government, as long as we unite as one, and conduct the rescue in a scientific way, then there will be the conditions and the ability to minimise the losses to the greatest degree and to overcome the disaster," Li said. The government has dispatched five drones to capture images of quake-hit areas and support rescue efforts.

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China rushes relief after Sichuan quake kills 180

Rescuers and relief teams struggled to rush supplies into the rural hills of China's Sichuan province Sunday after an earthquake left at least 180 people dead and more than 11,000 injured and prompted frightened survivors to spend a night in cars, tents and makeshift shelters.


The earthquake Saturday morning triggered landslides that cut off roads and disrupted phone and power connections in mountainous Lushan county, in Sichuan's Ya'an city area, which is further south on the same fault line where a devastating quake wreaked widespread damage across the region five years ago.

Hardest hit were villages further up the valleys, where farmers grow rice, vegetables and corn on terraced plots. Rescuers hiked into neighboring Baoxing county after its roads were cut off, reaching it overnight, state media reported. In Longmen village, authorities said nearly all the buildings had been destroyed in a frightening minute-long shaking by the quake.

In the fog-covered town of Shuangli, corn farmer Zheng Xianlan said Sunday that she had rushed from the fields back to her home when the quake struck, and cried when she saw that the roof collapsed. She then spent the night outdoors on a worn sofa using a plastic raincoat for cover.

"We don't earn much money. We don't know what we will do now," said 58-year-old Zheng, her eyes welling with tears. "The government only brought one tent for the whole village so far, but that's not enough for us."

Along the main roads, ambulances, fire engines and military trucks piled high with supplies waited in long lines, some turning back to try other routes when roads were impassable. Rescuers were forced to dynamite boulders that had fallen across roads, and rains Saturday night slowed rescue work, state media reported.

At the farming village of Longquan, where all the houses were damaged and some destroyed in the community of about 300 people, rescuers had arrived to collect the bodies of three dead, but had not yet provided other services as of Sunday midday, villagers said. Yang Shanqing, 37, said his father, brother and nephew were killed when their house collapsed.

"Now we don't have any drinking water or power," Longquan villager Yang Yiyun, 58, told The Associated Press. "All we can do is wait for the government to come and help us out."

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang had arrived Saturday afternoon by helicopter in Ya'an to direct rescue efforts, the government's official Xinhua News Agency reported.

"The current priority is to save lives," Li said, after visiting hospitals, tents and climbing on a pile of rubble to view the devastation, according to Xinhua.

Xinhua, citing the Sichuan province emergency command center, said at least 180 people were killed and 11,227 injured.

The quake - measured by China's earthquake administration at magnitude 7.0 and by the U.S. Geological Survey at 6.6 - struck shortly after 8 a.m. Saturday, when many people were at home, sleeping or having breakfast.

Tens of thousands of people moved into tents or cars, unable to return home or too afraid to go back as aftershocks continued to jolt the region. In Ya'an, residents sat in groups outside convenience stores watching the news on television sets early Sunday.

As in most natural disasters, the government mobilized thousands of soldiers and others, sending excavators and other heavy machinery as well as tents, blankets and other emergency supplies. Two soldiers died after their vehicle slide off a road and rolled down a cliff, state media reported.

The Chinese Red Cross said it had deployed relief teams with supplies of food, water, medicine and rescue equipment to the disaster areas.

Lushan, where the quake struck, lies where the fertile Sichuan plain meets foothills that eventually rise to the Tibetan plateau and sits atop the Longmenshan fault. It was along the same fault line that a devastating magnitude-7.9 quake struck on May 12, 2008, leaving more than 90,000 people dead or missing and presumed dead in one of the worst natural disasters to strike China in recent decades.

"It was just like May 12," Liu Xi, a writer in Ya'an city, said via a private message on his account on the Twitter-like Weibo service. "All the home decorations fell at once, and the old house cracked."

The official Xinhua News Agency said the well-known Bifengxia panda preserve, which is near Lushan, was not affected by the quake. Dozens of pandas were moved to Bifengxia from another preserve, Wolong, after its habitat was wrecked by the 2008 quake.

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In other news, a quake of 6.6 magnitude has hit Japan.

[rudrax]

Ah man! Another disaster.

[0veR]

Other day earthquake was in Iran and people died and now in China, so sad!

[majithia23]

Something is cooking in the mother earth's belly ....... :mellow:

2 Iran , 1 China , 1 Japan .......

[Nautilus]

sad news.......... :(

[ande]

Something is cooking in the mother earth's belly ....... :mellow:

2 Iran , 1 China , 1 Japan .......

[Shadowx]

Really sad news

[dMog]

http://quakes.globalincidentmap.com/ live earthquake map... as they happen.... and actually if you look at this map often...you will see that today has a lower number for the number of earthquakes..Most days there are literally a hundred of them daily..sort of debunks those that make the claims that H.A.R.P. is doing this from time to time

[DKT27]

http://quakes.globalincidentmap.com/ live earthquake map... as they happen.... and actually if you look at this map often...you will see that today has a lower number for the number of earthquakes..Most days there are literally a hundred of them daily..sort of debunks those that make the claims that H.A.R.P. is doing this from time to time

Notice how China, Japan and Taiwan ones are on the higher scale? :)

[dMog]

http://quakes.globalincidentmap.com/ live earthquake map... as they happen.... and actually if you look at this map often...you will see that today has a lower number for the number of earthquakes..Most days there are literally a hundred of them daily..sort of debunks those that make the claims that H.A.R.P. is doing this from time to time

Notice how China, Japan and Taiwan ones are on the higher scale? :)

look at the west coast of the USA and Alaska

[DKT27]

look at the west coast of the USA and Alaska

I see. But I don't see much about injuries in news. Over 200 being killed by an earth quake is still a big thing IMO. :)

And no, not talking about anything HARP, just saying. ;)

[dMog]

i would also imaging the death toll and injuries will be suppresses..after it is China they do not allow much info out during disaters...did i hear correct that a part of a mountain sheared off?

[nIGHT]

http://quakes.globalincidentmap.com/ live earthquake map... as they happen.... and actually if you look at this map often...you will see that today has a lower number for the number of earthquakes..Most days there are literally a hundred of them daily..sort of debunks those that make the claims that H.A.R.P. is doing this from time to time

I would prefer many smaller ones than a few massive earthquakes.

The few massive earthquakes cause more damage and kills much more. ;)

[mazigh]

http://quakes.globalincidentmap.com/ live earthquake map... as they happen.... and actually if you look at this map often...you will see that today has a lower number for the number of earthquakes..Most days there are literally a hundred of them daily..sort of debunks those that make the claims that H.A.R.P. is doing this from time to time

http://www.emsc-csem.org/#2 seems good too, btw why most earthquakes happen in mountainous areas?!

[jtmulc]

http://quakes.globalincidentmap.com/ live earthquake map... as they happen.... and actually if you look at this map often...you will see that today has a lower number for the number of earthquakes..Most days there are literally a hundred of them daily..sort of debunks those that make the claims that H.A.R.P. is doing this from time to time

http://www.emsc-csem.org/#2 seems good too, btw why most earthquakes happen in mountainous areas?!

Because the mountains are formed by the tectonic plates pushing in to one another. For example, the Himalayas are (very slowly) growing by the Indian plate pushing up against the Eurasian plate. You also see a lot of volcanoes along fault lines where one plate slides under another, like the Pacific Rim Of Fire.

[Vjcobra]

Really sad news :(