On the afternoon of January 7, Xinhua news agency quoted Chinese authorities as saying that 32 people were killed and 38 injured in a 6.8 magnitude earthquake in Dinh Nhat district, Xigaze city (Shigatse) of Tibet Autonomous Region. Thousands of homes in the area were damaged.
Map showing the earthquake area on January 7
The China Earthquake Network Center announced that the epicenter was recorded at coordinates 28.5 degrees north latitude and 87.45 degrees east longitude, with a depth of 10 km. The US Geological Survey said the earthquake was 7.1 on the Richter scale.
Video footage broadcast by CCTV showed many houses collapsing. “Dinh Nhat district and surrounding areas experienced very strong aftershocks and many buildings near the epicenter collapsed,” CCTV reported.
Local authorities are dispatching forces to areas to assess the impact of the earthquake. Currently, the temperature in Dinh Nhat is minus 8 degrees Celsius and will drop to minus 18 degrees Celsius tonight, according to the China Meteorological Administration.
This highland district has about 62,000 people and is located on the Chinese side of Mount Everest. This area often has earthquakes, but this is the strongest earthquake within a 200 km radius in the past 5 years.
According to AFP, shaking due to the earthquake was also recorded in Nepal’s capital Kathmandu and the Indian state of Bihar. Official Jagat Prasad Bhusal in Nepal’s Namche region near Everest said the earthquake caused strong shaking, waking people up.
Nepali and Indian authorities have not reported any damage or casualties. In 2015, a 7.8 magnitude earthquake in Nepal killed nearly 9,000 people and injured more than 22,000, destroying more than 500,000 houses.
