A truck runs past debris of
quake-destroyed walls in Datian Town, Renhe District of Panzhihua City,
southwest China's Sichuan Province. Twenty-two people were dead after an
earthquake measuring 6.1 on the Richter scale hit Panzhihua City on
Saturday. (Xinhua/Chen Haining)Photo Gallery>>>
PANZHIHUA, Sichuan, Aug. 31 (Xinhua) -- Three more
deaths were reported Sunday in Huili county, Sichuan Province, bringing the
death toll of Saturday's 6.1-magnitude quake to 28.
The quake also injured 238. Three others were missing
in Huili, which falls under the jurisdiction of Yi Autonomous Prefecture of
Liangshan, a neighbor of Panzhihua City, the epicenter of the quake, according
to Huili County Headquarters of Quake Control and Relief.
No details were available about the three dead
persons.
The quake struck the juncture of Renhe District in
Panzhihua and Huili County in Liangshan prefecture at 4:30 p.m.(Beijing time).
The epicenter was about 50 km southeast of downtown Panzhihua, at 26.2 degrees
north latitude and 101.9 degrees east longitude. It was at a depth of 10 km, the
China Earthquake Administration said.
QUAKE IMPACT AND DAMAGE
Residents gather on a tractor to evade
earthquake in Bailagu Village, Pingdi Town, Renhe District of Panzhihua
City, southwest China's Sichuan Province, August 31, 2008. Twenty-two
people were dead after an earthquake measuring 6.1 on the Richter scale
hit Panzhihua City happened at 4:30 p.m. (Beijing time) on Saturday. As of
9 p.m., 17 people were reported dead and about 100 others injured in
Sichuan, and five people dead and 35 others injured in neighboring Yunnan
Province.(Xinhua/Chen Haining) Photo
Gallery>>>
Areas
affected by the quake were Panzhihua, Huili of Liangshan, both in Sichuan, and
Yi Autonomous Prefecture of Chuxiong, Bai Autonomous Prefecture of Dali, Lijiang
and Zhaotong cities, all inYunnan Province. Kunming, the Yunnan capital, was
also hit.
Most of the fatalities, however, were in Huili,
followed by Chuxiong and Panzhihua. All three areas are on the southern end of
the fault line of the May 12 quake that left 69,226 people dead, 17,923 missing
and 374,643 others injured.
Another 6.0-plus magnitude quake, however, was not
expected in the area in the next two weeks, said Liu Jie, chief forecaster of
the Beijing-based Chinese Seismographic Information Center, on Saturday.
More than 300 aftershocks were also monitored in the
quake zone as of 5 a.m. on Sunday, according to Chinese earthquake networks.
Chinese earthquake networks monitored an aftershock
of 5.6 magnitude in the same area of Saturday's quake at 4:31 p.m. on Sunday. It
is not known if any new damage was caused.
The office for the emergency response of Panzhihua
City said preliminary investigations showed three people were killed and 65 were
injured in Saturday's quake.
Panzhihua City Quake Control and Relief Headquarters
on Sunday confirmed 70,462 people in the city were affected by the quake. In
addition, 32,247 people were displaced.
In total, 38,425 residences suffered damage in the
quake, of which 363 homes were toppled. Seven reservoirs, 22 highways and three
bridges were also damaged.
The Panzhihua education authority said cracks were
found on the buildings of more than 100 schools, of which 66 were in Renhe, a
hard-hit district in the city.
"I am afraid these schools will not open for the new
semester starting on Monday," said Shen Zhiqiang, an official with the Panzhihua
City bureau of education.
"The figure might go up, as damages in some primary
schools based in remote mountainous villages were not reported yet due to
inconvenient transport conditions," Shen said.
Further south, 600,000 people in five regions of
Yunnan, a neighboring province to Sichuan, were affected by the quake. This
included five deaths, 112 injured and the destruction of 130,00 residences, said
a Yunnan Provincial Bureau of Civil Affairs source.
The worst hit was Yi Autonomous Prefecture of Chuxiong where the five deaths were recorded. Destroyed were 111,448 homes, 656 school buildings and 213 buildings totaling 65,554 square meters of floor space. The direct economic loss was put at 500 million yuan (about 73 million U.S. dollars), according to the office for the quake control and relief headquarters of Chuxiong.
