At least 47 people have been killed and 300 injured in a strong earthquake in a hilly area in western China.
The magnitude 6.6 quake struck near the city of Dingxi in Gansu province, a region of mountains, desert and pastureland. It knocked down power lines and damaged homes.
Residents in the city described shaking windows. Tremors were felt in the provincial capital of Lanzhou 110 miles north, and as far away as Xi’an, 250 miles to the east.
With a population of 26 million, Gansu is one of China’s more lightly populated provinces, though the Dingzi area has a greater concentration of farms in rolling hills terraced with fields for crops and fruit trees. Dingxi has a total population of about 2.7 million.
The deaths and injuries were reported in Min County and other rural southern parts of the municipality, Dingxi Mayor Tang Xiaoming told state broadcaster CCTV. He said the damage was worst in the counties of Zhang and Min, where scores of homes were damaged and telephone and electricity services knocked out.
Su Wei, leader of a 120-member rescue team from the paramilitary People’s Armed Police, told state broadcaster CCTV that they were on their way to the epicentre, but progress was being slowed by mud and rock slides blocking the road.
The government’s earthquake monitoring centre said the initial quake at 7.45am was magnitude-6.6 and subsequent tremors included a magnitude-5.6.
The U.S. Geological Survey measured the magnitude of the initial quake as 5.9 and the depth at 6 miles.
Initial measurements of an earthquake can vary widely, especially if different monitoring equipment is used.
Dingxi is about 766 miles west of Beijing.
China’s worst earthquake in recent years was 7.9-magnitude, which struck the southwestern province of Sichuan in 2008, leaving 90,000 people dead or missing.
