Beijing: A powerful earthquake struck China’s remote Tibet region on Tuesday, killing at least nine people and causing “several buildings” to collapse, state media reported. Tremors were also felt in neighboring Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu.
A magnitude 6.8 earthquake struck Dingri County near the border with Nepal at 9:05 a.m. (0105 GMT), according to the China Earthquake Network Center (CENC). The US Geological Survey reported the earthquake’s magnitude as 7.1.
“Very strong tremors struck Dingri County and surrounding areas, and many buildings near the epicenter collapsed,” state broadcaster CCTV said.
“The reporter learned that nine people have been confirmed dead so far,” he said, adding that by 10 a.m., “several aftershocks” had been recorded, with a magnitude of 4.4.
Xinhua news agency said that “local officials are arriving in various townships of the county to assess the impact of the earthquake”.
The high-altitude county in the Tibet region is home to about 62,000 people and is located on the Chinese side of Mount Everest.
CENC said that although earthquakes are common in the region, Tuesday’s earthquake was the most powerful recorded within a radius of 200 kilometers in the past five years.
Along with Kathmandu, areas around Lobuche in Nepal in the high mountains near Everest were also shaken by the earthquake and aftershocks.
“There were very strong tremors here, everyone is awake, but we don’t know of any damage yet,” said Jagat Prasad Bhusal, a government official in Nepal’s Namche region, which is close to Everest.
Nepal lies on a major geological faultline where the Indian tectonic plate pushes into the Eurasian Plate, forming the Himalayas, and earthquakes are a regular occurrence.
In 2015, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck Nepal, killing nearly 9,000 people and injuring more than 22,000, destroying more than half a million homes.
