Death toll expected to mount in Yunnan earthquake

[Annihilation]

Death toll expected to mount in Yunnan earthquake

Five people are reported dead and more than 300 injured, but officials expect the numbers to rise after a 6.6-magnitude quake on Tuesday night hit in Jinggu and surrounding counties

PUBLISHED : Wednesday, 08 October, 2014, 11:40am
UPDATED : Wednesday, 08 October, 2014, 12:13pm

Laura Zhou and Nectar Gan [email protected], [email protected]

Rescue teams beginning up relief tents in Mengla village, Jinggu county, in Yunnan province after Tuesday night's earthquake. Photo: Xinhua

Witnesses in Jinggu county, Yunnan, say at least five people have died after Tuesday night’s 6.6-magnitude earthquake there. Official figures so far said one person had died and at least 324 injured, eight seriously. The death toll is expected to rise even further as more thorough checks of the area are made, the China Earthquake Administration said.

The owner of the Jianglong Hotel in Yongping town in Jinggu county, the epicentre of the quake, said he knew of five residents who had died and 28 injured from local text messages. He could not confirm them himself, however.

“We spent the night on the town square, sleeping in tents provided by the government,” the owner, who gave his surname as Jiang, told the South China Morning Post, “The aftershocks just kept coming. All the shops in town are closed today.”

Jiang said a few single-storey houses in the town had collapsed, but most buildings remained standing.

“I was scared, and I’m still very scared at this moment,” he said.

A worker at the Taili Hotel in Jinggu county, about 50km from Yongping, said she was working when the quake struck.

“The tremors were very strong, said the woman, surnamed Yang. “The whole building was shaking. The plaster on the wall fell off, and the water pipes on the top floor were all broken.”

Mobile phone signals were disrupted for more than half an hour after the quake, and had been unstable up to this morning, Yang said. She and her family slept outside their apartment building last night, fearing that the building may collapse in aftershocks. “Many people slept in the parks or by the lakefront last night,” she said.

About 13,000 homes were damaged, and about 7,000 collapsed in the quake, which affected more than 92,700 local residents in the county – located about 400km southwest of Kunming, the provincial capital, Xinhua reported. In addition, 56,880 people were evacuated, it said, and caused serious damage to infrastructure, including 36 bridges destroyed. More than 11,000 families suffered power outages.

It also caused a crack, 5-8cm wide, in a dam in Changhai Reservoir in Yongping town.

The Chengdu Military Area Command of the People’s Liberation Army has deployed more than 1,000 troops, paramilitary forces and medical workers to Jinggu, and 1,000 armed police officers based in the province were sent to the quake zone last night.

As of 8am today, the China Earthquake Administration said there had been 202 aftershocks in the region, with two of them registering magnitudes of 4 and 4.9.