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Dams in danger as death toll mounts
The death toll from China's deadliest earthquake in decades climbed to nearly 15,000 yesterday, as officials warned of calamities downstream from broken rivers and dams strained to bursting point.
- Reuters
- Published: 00:33 May 15, 2008
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Dujiangyan, China: The death toll from China's deadliest earthquake in decades climbed to nearly 15,000 yesterday, as officials warned of calamities downstream from broken rivers and dams strained to bursting point.
Thousands of Chinese troops have rushed to plug "extremely dangerous" cracks in a dam upriver from the earthquake-hit town of Dujiangyan in Sichuan province, state media said yesterday. The official Xinhua News Agency said 2,000 troops were sent to work on the Zipingpu Dam.
Troops, firefighters and civilians also raced to save more than 25,000 people buried across a wide swathe of southwest Sichuan province under collapsed schools, factories and hospitals after Monday's 7.9 magnitude quake.
Many schoolchildren were buried as they were taking an afternoon nap. One body of a boy was found still clutching a pen.
The official death toll climbed to 14,866, as rescuers pulled at tangled chunks of buildings for signs of life.
The government sent 50,000 troops to dig for victims. A paramilitary officer who arrived at Wenchuan, at the epicentre, told Sichuan TV a third of houses there had been destroyed and more than 90 per cent damaged.
Officials have warned of dangers from increased strain on local dams as well as mudslides on brittle hillsides where rain has been forecast over the next few days. Two hydropower stations in Maoxian county, where 7,000 residents and tourists remain stranded near the epicentre, were "seriously damaged". Authorities warned that dams could burst.
Landslides had blocked the flow of two rivers in northern Qingchuan county, forming a huge lake in a region where 1,000 have already died and 700 are buried, Xinhua said.
"The rising water could cause the mountains to collapse. We desperately need geological experts to carry out tests and fix a rescue plan," Xinhua quoted Li Hao, the county's Communist Party chief, as saying.
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