In Sichuan Province today we had a 7.8 7.9 scale earthquake at 14:28 that was felt across the country and all the way south-west to Vietnam and Thailand and east to Taipei. Needless to say it was a busy day and we will be working all night to help our staff from the region contact familly and prepare supplies, but I just want to report some basic information and will try to update later.
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Original text follows the updates.
Update 1 - please see FishOutOfWater's excellent Diary here and BruinKid's timely breaking news Diary here.
Update 2 - Please don't worry about me I'm OK in Shanghai. Our familly is mainly in Anhui, Yunnan and Heilongjiang, confirmed to be OK too, just some house damage. Mainly I want to help anyone if I can.
Update 3 - I'm surprosed to find this on the rec list overnight, I will be back in about an hour to respond to messages but first here are a few links to English publications with more up to date news:
Xinhua Chinaview Quake Page
BBC Asia-Pacific
International Herald Tribune Asia-Pacific
CNN
Asia Times
The death toll is expected to pass 10,000 and injured in hundreds of thousands. China has requested assistance for medical doctors, medicine and tents to deal with the situation.
Update 4 - Local news updates this morning provide a more clear picture of the situation and as expected the rural areas surrounding the epicenter have sustained more damage than originally known. I expect at least 15,000 perished although current estimates is 10,000. Much depends on the speed of rescuing those trapped and that's were the effort is now.
Contributions can be made to the Red Cross. But please don't forget about Myanmar, thier situation is grave and resources less, so consider split contributions if you can afford to.
NPR including donation links thanks to jimstaro
Some local information can be found on the following sites or blogs including some in CH for Kos members fluant or trying to get more localized information. One advise is you can post English to Chinese blogs and get a response, or go to Bilinguals such as Danweo or Global Voices. Thanks again for all the best wishes and support, I will try to respond all opens during my noon dinner.
English/Bilingual
Danwei Earthquake Blog
Global Voices Topic Page has some messages and videos with links to some other multilingual sites including some listed here. If you want a translation of Chinese content just ask, we GV users usually reply quickly.
Shanghaist Topic Page has a story list updating frequently with links.
A Reuters Slideshow shows the rescue situation
Chinese
QQ Earthquake video page many videos and message posts, even it's Chinese you can get an idea of the quake from some videos. QQ is a major CN blog/instant message site. Click to QQ main page for other site content.
Raine on Twitter Live Blog is running a message list with lots of local news.
Fanfou Blog - several users live blogging.
XDSF is another popular Chinese blog and this links to a discussion thread with eyewitness reports and photos, thanks to platypus
Update 5 - Wen Jiabao was on the scene at 7:00 and ordered every effort to open roads to Lixian and Maoxian County areas by 12:00PM so additional rescue workers could get to the scene, meanwhile supplies are being airlifted. Full Story. Related stories at this link detail rescue efforts here and here.
It's estimated 500,000 buildings have been destroyed or seriously damaged so an increasing death toll can be expected depending on the speed of rescues, so the PLA has been mobilized on a large scale to assist effort just as the US National Guard plays that role.
I will check back later. Sweet Dreams while you sleep.
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Original Post
The quake hit in mid-afternoon while schools, office and public buildings were full. Because the telecommunications across the region have be overloaded with traffic, it will be some time tomorrow before an accurate estimate of casualties and damage can be made, but as of this writing 23:00 Beijing time, it appears casulaties could be in the range of 7,000 to 9,000 deaths and injuried are already estiated in the thens of thousands. The government is rushing emergency services to various hot spots and Premier Wen Jiabao will be touring the worst hit areas by morning to make a personal survey.
The quake was centered in Eastern Sichuan approximately 100km from Chengdu the provincial capitol. In potentially worst cases known so far, a secondary scholl collapsed trapping 900 students in Dujiangyan City, Wenchuan County, Sichuan, and area where approximately 80% of buildings have sustained serious damage and have been evacuated.
Xinhua we handling reports as quickly as possible to provide information and if you wish you may check Xinhua News English Edition although I think the news updating there may be slow since the focus is on providing news in Chinese at the moment, if you are fluant, please go to Xinhua Net for more updated information. I think International services should be reporting soon as well.
Just a personal note, I know many Kos members have familly in China or are living in China, I think it will be very difficult to contact them in the next few days, but if you want me to relay messages by SMS it's one way and I shall try, you can e-mail me write2ko@yahooDOTcom or post here. Otherwise requesting people not to use the e-mail since the services are overwhelmed right now.
I will be off-line a few hours but try to check-in early morning.
Wishing everyone is safe. We have had worse, we will survive.
Ko