Tibet earthquake kills at least 16, injures 32
The magnitude 7 quake struck Baqen County in the Nagqu region on Thursday evening. Xinhua says it was the strongest earthquake in China since January 2024.
Archive image · Photo: Luo Shaoyang from Beijing, China / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0 (cropped and resized)
A powerful earthquake in northern Tibet has killed at least 16 people, China's state news agency Xinhua reported. Another 32 were injured, 11 of them seriously, Xinhua said, citing the emergency management bureau of Nagqu city. The magnitude 7 quake struck at 10:33 p.m. local time on Thursday (1433 GMT).
The epicenter was in Baqen County in the Nagqu region at a depth of about 10 kilometers, according to the China Earthquake Networks Center. The U.S. Geological Survey placed it in a mountainous area about 190 kilometers east-northeast of Nagqu and 390 kilometers northeast of the regional capital, Lhasa. Xinhua described it as the strongest quake to hit China since January 2024.
Authorities activated the second-highest level of emergency response. Cracks were reported in houses in villages near the epicenter. Videos from state media showed people leaving their homes and sheltering outdoors or in their cars. Firefighters sent an advance team equipped with devices to locate trapped people.