Hundreds feared dead in Chinese earthquake

Nearly 400 people are feared dead after a rapid series of strong earthquakes hit a mountainous and impoverished area of China's Qinghai province early Wednesday, state-run media said.


At least 10,000 others were injured, the Xinhua news agency reported, and many victims, including school children, were buried under debris. Rescuers were struggling to clear debris with their hands and save those trapped below.

A 6.9-magnitude earthquake, as measured by the U.S. Geological Survey, struck at 7:49 a.m. local time (7:49 p.m. ET Tuesday), when many citizens were still at home and schools were beginning the day. The USGS also recorded several strong aftershocks -- one of magnitude 5.8 -- all within hours of the initial quake.

The epicenter was located in remote and rugged terrain, about 150 miles (240 kilometers) northwest of Qamdo, Tibet. Qinghai borders the autonomous regions of Tibet and Xingjiang and the provinces of Gansu and Sichuan.

Karsum Nyima, deputy director of news at local Yushu TV, told Xinhua that most of the houses in the area were made of wood with earthen walls. He said some had come tumbling down, including a Buddhist pagoda in a park.

The temblors "have toppled houses, temples, gas stations and electric poles, triggered landslides, damaged roads, cut power supplies and disrupted telecommunications," Xinhua said. "A reservoir was also cracked, where workers are trying to prevent the outflow of water."


Chinese President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao ordered local authorities to "go all out to save the disaster-stricken people," Xinhua said. Vice Premier Hui Liangyu was dispatched to the region.

About 700 soldiers were working to clear rubble and rescue buried quake victims, according to Xinhua. More than 5,000 others, including soldiers and medical workers, were sent to the area, the Qinghai provincial government told reporters in a news conference, Xinhua said.

The news agency reported panic on the streets as crews launched rescue efforts in the rubble of collapsed buildings.

"We have to mainly rely on our hands to clear away the debris as we have no large excavating machines," police officer Shi Huajie said. "We have no medical equipment, either."

A Chinese military official told Xinhua that the death toll was expected to rise, given the damage to homes.

He said dispatched soldiers were setting up tents and transporting oxygen for the injured but affected roads leading to the airport could hamper relief efforts.

The Ministry of Civil Affairs plans to distribute 5,000 tents, 50,000 coats and 50,000 quilts to the earthquake zone, Xinhua said.

The Hong Kong Red Cross said it had mobilized 200,000 Hong Kong dollars (about $27,700) to support the relief operation through providing tents, quilts, clothes and food to victims.

The headquarters of the Red Cross Society of China was also sending relief supplies and had dispatched a team to the area for assessment, the organization said in a statement.


"Our top priority is to save students," Kang Zifu, an army officer in the town of Gyegu, told Xinhua. "Schools are always places that have many people."

Gyegu is the seat of government in the Yushu prefecture, a Tibetan region of Qinghai, the news agency said, and has a population of about 100,000.

More than 85 percent of houses in Gyegu had collapsed, a prefecture official told Xinhua.

"Many are buried in the collapsed houses, and there are still lots of others who are injured and being treated at local hospitals," he said.

The Hong Kong Red Cross said 90 percent of houses throughout Yushu had collapsed. Temperatures in the area are forecast to be around the freezing mark at night, the Red Cross said, so "provision of emergency shelters for the victims remains a high priority."

Many ethnic Tibetans live in Gyegu, said. One resident told that when his house began to shake, he grabbed his family and ran outside. There was another quake, and his house collapsed, he said. His family was currently housed outside in tents, he said, but he had managed to buy water. He said they had seen no government assistance.

People were living in fear, the man said, and some were headed up into the mountains to escape the threat of flooding, should the reservoir break.

The region is relatively poor and located in the foothills of the Himalayas at a relatively high altitude, Vause said. Many buildings are not well-constructed and unlikely to hold up well in a quake.

Given the landscape, rescue efforts are sure to be "challenging," said Francis Markus, of the International Federation of the Red Cross. He spoke from Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan, which experienced its own tragedy in May, 2008, when a magnitude-7.9 earthquake killed roughly 70,000 people.

"But China does have a lot of experience and a lot of resources," he said. "The capability is there. It's just a question of getting it to this remote spot."

Forecasters said Yushu would see strong winds and sleet in the coming days, which will hamper rescue efforts, Xinhua said.

Some Twitter users were outraged that Chinese television, did not feature the quake as its top story, instead headlining the U.S. nuclear summit in Washington that Hu is attending. Others blamed officials for failing to predict the quake.

"Of course this earthquake has been the headline for all the Chinese media," CCTV correspondent Fung Jinchao told . He said his network had sent a large group of reporters to the region.

Dozens dead from earthquake in Turkey

 A pre-dawn earthquake collapsed homes and killed more than 50 people in a mountainous region of southeastern Turkey Monday, government officials said.


About 71 others were injured when the earthquake struck at 4:32 a.m., according to officials. The U.S. Geological Survey registered the quake at magnitude 5.9, while the Turkish earthquake monitoring center listed it as a 6.0.


The quake struck in Elazig province, with the village of Okcular the worst hit, according to Ozcan Yalcin, the press secretary for the province's governor. Most of the mud brick homes in the village were destroyed, he said. Villagers had buried 15 of the people that died, he added.

"The people are sad but they are calm," Yalcin said. "They lost relatives and loved ones, they are crying, but all of their needs are being met by the state."

The quake killed 51 people, the office of the Prime Minister and Crisis Center in Elazig province said. The death toll revises an earlier report by Turkey Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek that at least 57 people had died. There was no further detail on the discrepancy.


Dozens of aftershocks, ranging up to magnitude 5.5, shook the region in the hours after the quake.

 "According to the information that we got from the technical teams on the ground, there shouldn't be anyone left in the rubble by now. But the search and rescue operations are continuing," said the deputy governor of Elazig, Mehmet Ali Saglam.

 "Most of the houses that were demolished in the villages are not cement houses. ... Other buildings, such as schools, were not destroyed," the deputy governor said.

"The Red Crescent is there. They are giving all kinds of help to the people. They are setting up tents. The weather is cloudy, 8 to 10 degrees Celsius (46 to 50 degrees Fahrenheit)."

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on television said: "Teams from the state mass housing project have also been sent to the area to study how to rebuild the area in different methods."


Monday's quake occurred near the meeting point of two major fault lines, geologists said.

The Northern Anatolian Fault and East Anatolian Fault juxtapose each other, in an area where other fault lines exist, said Okan Tuysuz, a professor of geology at Istanbul Technical University.

"The Anatolian plate, which is surrounded by these two different fault systems, moves every year 2.5 centimeters westwards," Tuysuz said. "And the movement of the Anatolian plate westwards creates different fault systems in this area. And the earthquake occurred in such a complex geological environment."

Turkey is periodically pummeled by deadly earthquakes. In 1999, two powerful earthquakes hit heavily populated areas near Istanbul, Turkey's largest city, killing at least 20,000 people.

Samoa Issued Alert to Begin Evacuations

Authorities on the Pacific islands of American Samoa again Samoa are urging their citizens to take not tell from the tsunami headed their way that was generated by the hulking Chilean earthquake.

American Samoa Lt. Gov. Aitofele Sunia has called on all residents on shorelines villages to move to dominant grounds, future police consequence Samoa have issued a nationwide jovial to begin coastal evacuations.

The tsunami is expected to gain the islands Saturday morning.

The American Samoa government has activated misfortune services with off care police officers besides contra distinct first responders to account to their aegis through soon considering possible.

Meanwhile, disaster subjection officials in Fiji say they had been warned to feel waves of between since high considering 7.5 feet (2.3 meters) to hit the northern and eastern islands of the archipelago and the nearby Tonga islands.

On Sept. 29, a tsunami spawned by a magnitude-8.3 earthquake killed 34 people effect American Samoa, 183 in Samoa and nine in Tonga. Scientists next said that wave was 46 feet (14 meters) high.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. shake on back soon for additional information. AP's earlier story is below.

Family importance Hawaii were urgently told to protect lives again property from a tsunami safari the Pacific now fast in that a jetliner beside a devastating earthquake pressure Chile.

Tsunami waves were likely to grill Asian, Australian besides fresh Zealand shores within 24 hours of the earthquake, which struck early Saturday on Chile's coast.

Though notoriously hard to predict, the tsunami was not expected to embody as devastating as the waves generated after a magnitude-9.5 earthquake go over Chile in 1960. Most countries, awaiting further data, did not direction evacuations Saturday but instead advised relatives imprint low-lying areas to watch for additional updates.

The windless Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii advised that a tsunami was possible in the northern Pacific, including the U.S. West Coast and Alaska.

''Sea-level readings confirm that a tsunami has been generated which could give impulse widespread damage,'' the center said in a memorandum beside the magnitude-8.8 crush. ''Authorities should carry designate action to respond to this threat.''

The limelight esteemed that tsunami indicate heights are difficult to predict owing to they charge vary significantly along a coast fit to the diagnostic topography.

Some Pacific nations in the warning area were heavily distressed by a tsunami outlive year. On Sept. 29, a tsunami spawned by a magnitude-8.3 earthquake killed 34 kinsfolk in American Samoa, 183 network Samoa and nine string Tonga. Scientists later said that gesticulate was 46 feet (14 meters) high.

Past South American earthquakes have had deadly effects across the Pacific.

A tsunami closest the magnitude-9.5 percussion that buffeted Chile in 1960, the largest earthquake ever recorded, killed about 140 people in Japan, 61 in Hawaii and 32 connections the Philippines. That tsunami was about 3.3 to 13 feet (apart to four meters) in height, Japan's Meteorological Agency said.

The tsunami from Saturday's quake was to come to be much smaller now the quake itself was not because strong.

Japanese civic broadcaster NHK quoted earthquake experts as saying the tsunami would likely be tens of centimeters (inches) notable and reach Japan in about 22 hours. A tsunami of 28 centimeters (11 inches) was recorded abutting a magnitude-8.4 earthquake near Chile in 2001.

The Meteorological author said live was still investigating the likelihood of a tsunami from the magnitude-8.8 brunt and did not surface a formal coastal warning.

Australia, meanwhile, was lay foundation on a tsunami watch.

The Joint Australian Tsunami Warning Center issued a tsunami warning Saturday night tide owing to a ''potential tsunami threat'' to increased South Wales state, Queensland state, Lord Howe Island and Norfolk Island. Any violence signal would not needle Australia until Sunday morning local time, it said.

The Philippine enter upon of Vulcanology and Seismology issued a low-level alert saying people should await fresh edict of a possible tsunami. legitimate did not stimulate evacuations.

Seismologist Fumihiko Imamura, of Japan's Tohoku University, told NHK that residents near ocean shores should not decry the power of a tsunami even though they may be generated by quakes thousands of miles (kilometers) first off.

Massive earthquake strikes Chile

A massive earthquake with an initial magnitude of 8.8 has struck central Chile.

The quake struck at 0634 GMT about 91km (56 miles) north-east of the city of Concepcion and 317km south-west of the capital, Santiago.

Outgoing President Michelle Bachelet said that she had reports of six deaths so far and could not rule out that there might be more.

The US issued an initial tsunami warning for Chile, Peru and Ecuador.

That was later extended to Colombia, Antarctica, Panama and Costa Rica.

Japan's meteorological agency has warned of a potential tsunami across large areas of the Pacific.

President Bachelet called on people to remain calm and contact the authorities if they needed help.

Ms Bachelet, who has now gone into an emergency meeting, said that there were areas of the country where communications were down and teams were working to restore them.

Buildings in Santiago were reported to have shaken for between 10 and 30 seconds, with the loss of electricity and communications.

The US Geological Survey (USGS) said the earthquake struck at a depth of about 35km.

It said tsunami effects had been observed at Valparaiso, west of Santiago, with a wave height of 1.29m above normal sea level.

One journalist speaking to Chilean national television from the city of Temuco, 600km south of Santiago, said many people there had left their homes, determined to spend the rest of the night outside. Some people on the streets were in tears.

Mark Winstanley, 100km north-west of Santiago, said buildings had shaken and electricity and phone connections were cut but he could see no structural damage yet.

A university professor in Santiago, Cristian Bonacic, said that this was a massive quake but that the cities seemed to have resisted well. Internet communications were working but not mobile phones.

Chile suffered the biggest earthquake of the 20th century when a 9.5 magnitude quake struck the city of Valdivia in 1960, killing 1,655 people.