Dozens of houses collapse as 7.1 magnitude earthquake rattles western China

A magnitude 7.1 earthquake struck a sparsely populated part of China's Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, injuring six people and damaging or collapsing more than 120 homes in freezing cold weather, authorities said.

Tuesday's quake was the latest in a series of seismic events and natural disasters to hit the vast country's western regions.

The quake rocked Uchturpan county in Aksu prefecture shortly after 2 am (1800 GMT Monday), the China Earthquake Networks Center said. Around 200 rescuers were dispatched to the epicentre. The county is called Wushi in the Mandarin language spoken by most Chinese.

Of the six people hurt, two had serious injuries and four were minor. In addition, 47 houses collapsed, 78 houses were damaged and some agricultural structures collapsed, the government of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region posted on its official Weibo social media account.

The quake downed power lines but electricity was quickly restored, Aksu authorities reported. Moun tainous Uchturpan county had around 233,000 people in 2022, according to local authorities.

Urumqi Railroad Bureau resumed services after 7 am (2300 GMT Monday) following safety checks that confirmed no problems on the train lines. The suspension had affected 23 trains, the bureau serving the region's capital said on its official Weibo account.

The US Geological Survey said the quake measured 7.0 magnitude and occurred in the seismically active Tian Shan mountain range. It said the area's largest quake in the past century was 7.1 magnitude and occurred in 1978 about 200 kilometres (124 miles) to the north of one early Tuesday.

Multiple aftershocks were recorded, the strongest of them at 5.3 magnitude.

Uchturpan county is recording temperatures well below freezing, with lows down to negative 18 degrees C (just below zero F) forecast by the China Meteorological Administration this week.

In Yunnan province in China's southwest, rescue workers were still searching for victims buried by a landslide Monday in the village of Liangshui. Eleven bodies have been recovered, and two survivors were rescued from among the 47 people buried in 18 homes in freezing cold and falling snow.

Earthquakes are common in western China, including in Gansu, Qinghai, Sichuan and Yunnan provinces, as well as the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region and Tibet.

A 6.2 magnitude earthquake that struck Gansu in December killed 151 people and was China's deadliest quake in nine years. An earthquake that hit Sichuan in 2008 killed nearly 90,000 people. The collapse of schools and other buildings led to a yearslong effort to rebuild using more quake-resistant materials.