Quake Brings Grim Repetition to China

BEIJING, Sept. 1 -- It was a familiar scene: Rescue teams headed into an earthquake zone Sunday to help tens of thousands of frightened farmers deal with hundreds of aftershocks and a shortage of tents.

Less than a week after the close of the Olympic Games, which brought mostly good news to China's government, officials struggled with the aftermath of a 6.1-magnitude earthquake that killed at least 32 people and injured hundreds Saturday.

The official New China News Agency said Monday that more than 250,000 homes had collapsed or been destroyed. The news agency said it was unclear how many more people were buried in rubble near the epicenter of the quake, about 30 miles southeast of Panzhihua, a city in southern Sichuan province.

The temblor destroyed nearly 400 houses in Panzhihua and 1,000 in neighboring Liangshan, the China Earthquake Administration said on its Web site.

"All the houses in our village have nearly collapsed, and right now we are risking our lives to bring our belongings out of our homes," said Xiong Mei, a farmer from Nanhai village in Liangshan prefecture who spent the rainy night in the courtyard of her partially destroyed home.

"In our village, there are 60 to 70 people who are seriously injured and staying in the playground of our elementary school," she said. "We don't have enough clothes or canvas to shelter ourselves, so we have to sew plastic bags together."

Xiong, 37, was near the epicenter of the massive May 12 Sichuan earthquake that killed nearly 70,000. On Sunday, there was only one tent assigned to her production unit in the village -- a way of organizing and managing rural residents by their jobs -- and it was not enough for the elderly and weak. "From yesterday to this afternoon, we've only eaten once. I am very frightened. The year of 2008 is a year full of disasters," Xiong said.

A man in the rescue supplies office of the Panzhihua Municipal Civil Affairs Bureau said the city needed several thousand more tents and possibly other supplies, such as food and clean water. "The biggest problem for us is a shortage of big tents and blankets. We have already distributed more than 2,000 tents," said the man, who gave only his surname, Cao. "We sent most of our people to the countryside to see if any people are still buried. The situation there is still unclear now."

Many Chinese think 2008 has already brought more than their fair share of bad luck. Crippling snowstorms struck Guangdong province during the Chinese New Year travel period, and many Chinese include the Tibet riots and protests against the Olympic torch relay in this year's negative news.

"There are so many disasters this year, and the people's mood is very low here," said Ju Guihua, 46, a nurse at a county hospital in Panzhihua that had admitted two quake survivors with broken legs. "The earthquakes are a serious and somber topic around here."

Xu Zhencong, 51, a teacher in Dalongtan town in Panzhihua, was riding a motorcycle home when the quake struck.

"I saw dust in the air from the collapsed houses. And just now, I felt two aftershocks," Xu said. "Today the government sent people to the village to check, but we only have four tents, so I have to buy rain clothes and set up a shelter by myself."

Researcher Zhang Jie contributed to this report.