China earthquake death toll rises to 148

BEIJING - The toll from

China’s deadliest earthquake in years

rose to 148 on Dec 22, state media reported, as the authorities turned their attention to resettling thousands of people displaced by the disaster.

The quake, which struck north-west China just before midnight on Dec 18, has killed at least 117 people in Gansu province and 31 in neighbouring Qinghai, the official Xinhua news agency said.

More than 139,000 people have been moved to emergency shelters across the two provinces, state broadcaster CCTV said, adding that rescuers in Gansu were “fully shifting the focus of their work towards resettling affected populations and treating the injured”.

But emergency response teams were still searching for trapped victims in Qinghai on the morning of Dec 22, according to CCTV.

People were buried alive in Qinghai’s Zhongchuan township on Dec 19 after a “sand boil” – a phenomenon that can occur during an earthquake when soil liquefies and forces sand and water out of the ground.

The quake was China’s deadliest since 2014, when more than 600 people were killed in south-western Yunnan province.

Almost 1,000 were injured across the two provinces after the shallow tremor on Dec 18, measured at a magnitude of 5.9 by the United States Geological Survey.

Dozens of smaller aftershocks followed.

Sub-zero temperatures have

made the aid operation even more challenging,

with AFP reporters seeing survivors huddling around outdoor fires to keep warm days after the quake. AFP