By CHRIS JEWERS (Mail Online)
CHINA — An overnight earthquake killed at least 118 people in a cold and mountainous region in northwestern China, in the nation’s deadliest quake in a decade.
Rescuers are now in a race to find survivors trapped beneath rubble left in the wake of the 6.2-magnitude tremor, which destroyed buildings and sparked landslides.
Emergency authorities in Gansu province appealed for 300 additional workers to comb through collapsed buildings and for other search and rescue operations. According to Chinese state-owned media, officials in neighboring Qinghai reported 20 people missing in a landslide.
The quake injured more than 500 people, severely damaged houses and roads, and knocked out power and communication lines, provincial officials and media reports said.
It struck just before midnight on Monday near the boundary between the two provinces at a relatively shallow depth of six miles, the China Earthquake Networks Center said.
The US Geological Survey measured the magnitude at 5.9.
(Courtesy of Mail Online UK/ai/mnm)
