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Over 50,000 people have been relocated to safer locations after damages were caused to buildings due a powerful earthquake of 6.8-magnitude that jolted Luding County in China’s southwest Sichuan province which claimed the lives of 46 people so far.
As of Monday night, 16 people were missing and over 50 injured, Wang Feng, deputy director of the Sichuan provincial emergency management department told a media briefing in Chengdu.
Among the dead, 29 were from Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture which administers Luding County, and the other 17 were from Ya’an City. Over 50,000 people in Ganzi and Ya’an have been evacuated to safety, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
The 6.8-magnitude earthquake jolted Luding County at 12:52 pm on Monday (Beijing Time), according to the China Earthquake Networks Center (CENC).
Sichuan has activated the highest level of emergency response for the earthquake.
As of 6 pm Monday, the province had deployed over 6,500 rescuers, four helicopters and two unmanned aerial vehicles to the frontline.
«There were many aftershocks, and some roads were blocked. We had to climb over the debris to get to the town square of Moxi,» a rescuer from the provincial forest fire brigade was quoted as saying to Xinhua.
