Earthquake kills 65, triggers landslides in southwest China

BEIJING, Sept. 6 (BNA) – The strong earthquake that caused landslides and shook buildings in southwest China killed at least 65 people and injured hundreds, official media said today, Tuesday.

At least 16 more people were missing a day after the quake hit a mountainous area in Luoding County in Sichuan Province, where tectonic plates meet, and is regularly hit by earthquakes. The earthquake shook buildings in the provincial capital Chengdu, whose 21 million residents are already living under COVID-19 lockdown.

Electricity was cut off and buildings were damaged in the historic town of Moxi in the Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Gars, where 37 people were killed. And the new China News Agency (Xinhua) reported that tents were set up for more than 50,000 people who were moved from homes that became unsafe due to the earthquake.

State broadcaster CCTV showed rescue crews pulling an apparently uninjured woman from a collapsed house in Moxi, where many of the buildings were made of a mixture of wood and brick. About 150 people with varying degrees of injuries have been reported.

Twenty-eight people were killed in neighboring Ximian County, on the outskirts of Yan City. There were reports that 248 people were injured, mostly in Moxi, and another 12 people were missing.

Three of the dead were workers in the Heilogu Scenic Area, a forest and glacier nature reserve.

Besides the deaths, authorities have reported falling stones and soil from mountainsides, causing damage to homes and power outages, CCTV reported. The Ministry of Emergency Management reported that a landslide closed a country highway, leaving it littered with stones.

Buildings shook in Chengdu, 200 kilometers (125 miles) from the epicenter.

The earthquake and shutdown were followed by a heat wave and drought that led to water shortages and power outages due to Sichuan’s dependence on hydropower. It comes on top of the latest major shutdown under China’s strict “no spread of coronavirus” policy.

The deadliest earthquake in China in recent years was the 7.9-magnitude earthquake in 2008 that killed nearly 90,000 people in Sichuan. The earthquake destroyed towns, schools, and rural communities outside Chengdu, leading to years of efforts to rebuild with more resistant materials.

HF