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Death toll from magnitude-6.1 quake in SW China jumps to 28

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-08-31 21:05

More than 300 aftershocks were also monitored in the quake zone as of 5 a.m. on Sunday, according to Chinese earthquake networks.

Chinese earthquake networks monitored an aftershock of 5.6 magnitude in the same area of Saturday's quake at 4:31 p.m. on Sunday. It is not known if any new damage was caused.

The office for the emergency response of Panzhihua City said preliminary investigations showed three people were killed and 65 were injured in Saturday's quake.

Panzhihua City Quake Control and Relief Headquarters on Sunday confirmed 70,462 people in the city were affected by the quake. In addition,32,247 people were displaced.

In total, 38,425 residences suffered damage in the quake, of which 363 homes were toppled. Seven reservoirs, 22 highways and three bridges were also damaged.

The Panzhihua education authority said cracks were found on the buildings of more than 100 schools, of which 66 were in Renhe, a hard-hit district in the city.

"I am afraid these schools will not open for the new semester starting on Monday," said Shen Zhiqiang, an official with the Panzhihua City bureau of education.

"The figure might go up, as damages in some primary schools based in remote mountainous villages were not reported yet due to inconvenient transport conditions," Shen said.

Further south, 600,000 people in five regions of Yunnan, a neighboring province to Sichuan, were affected by the quake. This included five deaths, 112 injured and the destruction of 130,00 residences, said a Yunnan Provincial Bureau of Civil Affairs source.

The worst hit was Yi Autonomous Prefecture of Chuxiong where the five deaths were recorded. Destroyed were 111,448 homes, 656 school buildings and 213 buildings totaling 65,554 square meters of floor space. The direct economic loss was put at 500 million yuan (about 73 million US dollars), according to the office for the quake control and relief headquarters of Chuxiong.

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