Rescue workers brave cold in search for earthquake survivors
8 January 2025, 04:44
Tents, quilts and other relief items were being delivered to provide shelter for victims of the tremor in Tibet.
Rescue workers in the cold, high-altitude Tibet region in western China searched for more survivors and victims on Wednesday, one day after a strong earthquake levelled thousands of houses and killed at least 126 people.
Tents, quilts and other relief items were being delivered to provide shelter for those whose homes are uninhabitable or unsafe.
Temperatures fell well below freezing overnight in an area with an average altitude of about 4,200 metres (13,800 feet).
The confirmed death toll stood at 126 with another 188 injured on Tuesday evening.
The earthquake struck about 50 miles from Mount Everest and the border with Nepal, where the shaking sent people running out of their homes in the capital Kathmandu.
The dead included at least 22 of the 222 residents of Gurum, the village’s Communist Party chief Tsering Phuntsog told the official Xinhua News Agency on Tuesday.
The victims included his 74-year-old mother and several other of his relatives remained buried in the debris.
“Even young people couldn’t run out of the houses when the earthquake hit, let alone old people and children,” he said.
More than 3,600 houses collapsed, according to a preliminary survey and 30,000 residents had been relocated, Xinhua said, citing the city government in Shigatse, which is called Xigaze in Chinese.
The Ministry of Emergency Management has 1,850 rescuers on the ground, state broadcaster CCTV said, along with firefighters and others.
More than 500 aftershocks were recorded after the earthquake, which the US Geological Survey said was magnitude 7.1. China’s earthquake centre recorded a magnitude of 6.8.
