22 killed as new quake hits southwest towns

2008-8-31

TWENTY-TWO people were killed yesterday by an earthquake measuring 6.1 on the Richter scale which hit Panzhihua City on the border of Sichuan and Yunnan provinces in southwest China.

Late last night, 17 people were reported dead and about 100 others injured in Sichuan, and five dead and 26 others injured in neighboring Yunnan Province.

The quake struck the juncture of Renhe District of Panzhihua and Huili County of Liangshan Prefecture at 4:30pm. The epicenter was about 50 kilometers southeast of downtown Panzhihua and at a depth of 10 kilometers, the National Seismograph Network Center said.

In Panzhihua, a 54-year-old man was killed by debris in Miyi County and another person was killed in Yanbian County. Nearly 1,000 houses were destroyed and cracks appeared in the walls of more than 400 houses.

In the affected counties of Liangshan Prefecture, 86 people were injured, and many houses were destroyed or in dangerous condition. The number of people buried in the ruins was not immediately available.

The quake hit Chuxiong Prefecture in Yunnan Province, leaving five people dead and 26 others injured, 11 severely as of late last night, said a prefecture government official.

The casualties in Yunnan were reported in Yongren, Yuanmou, Wuding and Dayao counties, in which four deaths were in Yuanmou, about 55 kilometers from the epicenter, and another in Yongren, about 30 kilometers from the epicenter.

"Locals in the county rushed out into the open during the quake as cracks appeared on house walls and many windows were broken," said Zheng Zhouwei, a local legislator in Yongren.

Yunnan's capital, Kunming, about 150 kilometers from the epicenter, and Sichuan's capital of Chengdu both felt the tremor. Due to poor communications in the affected regions, casualty details were still being assessed last night. An average 118 people live on one square kilometer in the quake-stricken area.

On May 12, a 7.9 magnitude earthquake in northern Sichuan killed nearly 70,000 people and left 5 million homeless. The region has been hit by scores of aftershocks.

Also yesterday, an earthquake measuring 5.3 on the Richter scale hit Hejing County, Bayingolin Autonomous Prefecture in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. The quake struck at 8:46 pm, with the depth of its epicenter estimated at about 10 kilometers, the National Seismograph Network Center said.

No casualties had been reported last night.

Early last week a strong tremor measuring 6.8 on the Richter scale rocked Zhongba County, Xigaze Prefecture in Tibet but no casualties have so far been reported.

Inspection team leader Zhu Quan said yesterday the Tibet Seismological Bureau was continuing to assessing the damage.

"Some sections of roads in the county are still blocked by mountain rocks that fell during the quake and are hampering inspections," said Zhu.