Beijing: A strong earthquake with magnitude
of 6.2 struck northwest China on Friday, sending tremors through a
remote mining area along the nation`s Qinghai-Tibetan plateau,
officials said.
The epicentre of the quake, which struck at 9:52 am (0722
IST), was located 165 kilometres northeast of Golmud city in
Qinghai province, the US Geological Survey (USGS) reported.
The quake hit at a relatively shallow depth of 10
kilometres.
Nearly 350 aftershocks shook the area in the hours
following the initial quake, with the biggest at a magnitude
of 5.3, the China Earthquake Administration said.
There were no immediate reports of casualties.
"We are still awaiting initial damage reports," an
official in the civil affairs office of the Haixi
Mongolian-Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture government told AFP
today on phone.
"We are checking for damage in many places that are in
remote areas where not many people are living. So far, there
have been no reports of fatalities," he said, asking not to be
named.
The railway linking Beijing and Tibet that runs through
Golmud was operating normally and was not expected to suffer
any damage, the China News Service cited a local seismologist
as saying.
The earthquake zone, which is home to ethnic Mongolians
and Tibetan farmers and herdsmen, is dotted with coal, tin,
lead and copper mines.
The prefecture`s government has dispatched search and
rescue teams to assess damage throughout the sparsely
populated region, the official said.
Bureau Report
