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Earthquake death toll rises to 144 in China

22 December 2023 10:01 (UTC +04:00)

Hundreds of temporary one-room housing units were set up Thursday (Dec 21) in northwest China for survivors of an earthquake that destroyed more than 14,000 homes and killed at least 144 people, APA reports citing The Star.

The death toll rose by nine as search teams dug through heavy mudslides that had inundated two villages, a city official in Qinghai province said on Friday morning. Three people remained missing in the mudslides.

State broadcaster CCTV showed footage of cranes lifting white, box-like housing units and lining them up in an open field in Meipo, a village in Gansu province. About 260 had been erected, and the total in the village was expected to reach 500 across nine sites by Friday morning.

The arrival of the prefabricated units was a sign that many of the more than 87,000 people resettled after the Monday night earthquake may be homeless for some time. Many have been enduring temperatures well below freezing in flimsier tent-like units with blue plastic sheeting on the outside and a quilted cotton lining inside.