A magnitude 6.2 earthquake struck a remote mountainous region on the northern edge of China's Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau shortly before midnight on Monday, killing at least 118 people and injuring hundreds more, according to Chinese state media, reports UNN citing Reuters.
Details
Authorities quickly mobilized a raft of emergency measures after the quake destroyed roads and infrastructure, triggered landslides and half-filled the village with silt. But rescue efforts proved difficult in sub-zero temperatures as much of China faced sub-zero weather conditions after a massive cold wave swept across the country.
At 23:59 local time on Monday, the earthquake struck Jishishan county in Gansu province at a depth of 10 km, according to the China Seismic Network Center (CENC). The epicenter was 5 km from the border between Gansu and neighboring Qinghai province, where strong tremors were also felt. The strong earthquake struck about 100 kilometers southwest of the Chinese city of Lanzhou, near the Gansu-Qinghai border region, at midnight on Tuesday.
In Gansu, 105 people were dead as of 7:50 a.m. local time Tuesday, while 16 of the 397 injured were in critical condition as of 9:30 a.m., provincial authorities said. The death toll in Qinghai rose to at least 13, with 182 injured. Twenty people remained officially missing.
As the disaster zone is in a high mountainous region where the weather is cold, rescue efforts are aimed at preventing secondary disasters caused by factors other than the earthquake, Xinhua reported. On Tuesday morning, the temperature in Linxia, Gansu, near where the quake struck, was around minus 14 degrees Celsius.
While 72 hours after an earthquake is the most likely time to rescue survivors, it will be shortened due to severe weather and victims trapped will face a higher risk, the report said.
Some damage is reported to water, electricity, transportation, communications and other infrastructure.
Numerous landslides damaged dozens of highways and rural roads, but no injuries were reported.
State media footage shows fire and rescue service personnel combing through the rubble of collapsed buildings.
A large hydroelectric dam 50 km from the earthquake epicenter was not damaged. The CCTV system reported that the dam on the upper reaches of the Yellow River was operating normally.
In a village in Qinghai, an earthquake triggered a landslide that left many houses half covered in brown silt. Local media reported that rescuers used drones, excavators and bulldozers to search for and rescue survivors.
The tremors were felt 1,000 kilometers away in the central province of Henan, where local media shared videos of furniture swaying in people's homes.
Preliminary analysis shows the quake was a tremor, one of three earthquakes with a magnitude above 6 that have occurred within 200 kilometers of the epicenter since 1900, CCTV reported. State media reported at least 32 tremors within an hour of the quake.
According to CENC, a total of nine aftershocks of magnitude 3.0 or higher had been recorded by Tuesday morning, two of which had a magnitude of at least 4.0.
According to CENC, about 3,000 kilometers from Jishishan in the Xinjiang region, another earthquake with a magnitude of about 5.5 and at a depth of 10 kilometers struck at 9:46 a.m. local time on Tuesday.
Supplement
Earthquakes are common in China's western provinces, such as Gansu, lying on the eastern border of the tectonically active Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. China's deadliest earthquake in decades occurred in 2008, when an 8.0 magnitude quake struck Sichuan, killing nearly 70,000 people.