A magnitude 6.2 earthquake hit one of the poorest regions of China just before midnight on Monday, killing at least 126 people, injuring hundreds, and toppling mud houses in remote villages.
Chinese state media that arrived in the village of Dahe, one of the hardest-hit areas in Gansu province in northwest China, reported that many houses were at risk of collapsing or had already collapsed, especially houses built with earth and clay.
“I have lived for over 80 years and had never seen such a big earthquake,” said an elderly man who was being carried out of his damaged house.
Over 155,000 homes in Gansu were damaged or destroyed.
At 11:59 pm (12:59 pm Brasília time) on Monday, the earthquake shook Jishishan county in Gansu, at a depth of 10 km. The epicenter was 5 km from the provincial border between Gansu and Qinghai, where strong tremors were also felt.
Authorities mobilized a series of emergency responses after the earthquake destroyed roads and infrastructure, triggered landslides, and buried half of a village in mud. But rescue work has proven challenging in below-freezing temperatures, after a severe cold snap swept through the country.
Earthquakes are common in provinces like Gansu, located on the northeastern border of the tectonically active Qinghai-Tibetan plateau. China’s deadliest earthquake in recent decades was in 2008, when a magnitude 8.0 quake hit Sichuan, killing nearly 70,000 people.
In Gansu, 113 people had died as of 1 pm on Tuesday (2 am Brasília time), with 536 injured, according to officials.
The death toll in Qinghai rose to at least 13, with 182 injured.
Officially, 20 people are still missing.
About 2,200 firefighters from Gansu province and 900 forest rangers, along with 260 emergency rescue professionals, have been deployed to the disaster zone, Xinhua news agency reported, adding that hundreds of military and police personnel have also been sent.
