Dozens Feared Dead As Strong Magnitude 6.8 Earthquake Hits Western China
At least 53 people have been reportedly killed, while 62 others injured by a strong magnitude 6.8 earthquake that rocks Tibet in southwest of China, which borders India and Nepal.
The quake hit at 9:05am (0105 GMT), with its epicentre located in Tingri, a rural Chinese county known as the northern gateway to the Everest region, at a depth of 10 km (6.2 miles), according to the China Earthquake Networks Centre.
The U.S. Geological Service put the quake’s magnitude at 7.1.
Reuters reports that the Tuesday incident shook buildings in neighbouring Nepal, Bhutan and India and many others were also trapped.
The official Xinhua News Agency said 62 other people were injured, citing the regional disaster relief headquarters.
The magnitude 7.1 quake struck in a mountainous area in the Tibet region, near the border with Nepal, at a depth of about six miles, the US Geological Survey (USGS) said.
Tuesday’s epicentre was around 80 km (50 miles) north of Everest, the world’s highest mountain and a popular destination for climbers and trekkers.
The average altitude in the area around the epicentre is about 13,800 feet, state broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV) said.
The CCTV online report said there were a handful of communities within three miles) of the epicentre, which was 240 miles from Lhasa, the capital of Tibet.
In the Nepalese capital of Kathmandu, the earthquake sent residents running out of their homes after they were woken up by the tremor.
No information was immediately available from the remote, mountainous areas closer to the epicentre across the border.
There have been 10 earthquakes of at least magnitude 6 in the area where Tuesday’s quake hit over the past century, the USGS said.
Streets were filled with people woken up by the tremor.
A 7.8 magnitude earthquake killed some 9,000 people and damaged about 1 million structures in Nepal in 2015.
