Study Warned of China Quake Risk Nearly a Year Ago

Kevin Holden Platt in Beijingfor National Geographic News

Just ten months before a deadly earthquake struck Sichuan Province's Beichuan county on May 12, a scientific study warned that the Chinese region was ripe for a major quake.
After examining satellite images and conducting on-the-ground inspections of deep, active faults in Sichuan Province for more than a decade, scientists issued a warning. "The faults are sufficiently long to sustain a strong ground-shaking earthquake, making them potentially serious sources of regional seismic hazard," the Chinese, European, and U.S. geoscientists wrote in the mid-July 2007 edition of the journal Tectonics.
They concluded that clashing tectonic forces were growing in Beichuan, ready to burst in an explosion of seismic energy.
With precision and what now seems like eerie foresight, the researchers charted the active faults on multicolored maps of Beichuan, which turned out to be the epicenter of the recent earthquake.
"As far as I know, this is the only investigation of these active faults," said study co-author Michael Ellis of the Center for Earthquake Research and Information at the University of Memphis in Tennessee.
(Related: "China Quake Delivered Seismic One-Two Punch" [May 15, 2008].)
The magnitude 7.9 quake that struck on May 12 almost entirely leveled parts of Sichuan Province. Chinese officials today estimated that the death toll would reach 50,000 and that nearly five million people are homeless.
(See photos of the earthquake's destruction.)
"Locked in a Journal"
There is little reason to believe Chinese officials were aware of the July 2007 report, or that it would have made much difference if they had been.
"We had certainly identified the potential of these active faults," Ellis said. "But that information was effectively locked in an academic journal."

Ellis hopes that replacing the collapsed buildings with earthquake-proof structures could prevent future tragedies.
"I've been to these little towns [before the quake]," Ellis said. "Most of the houses are built of unreinforced masonry, and you can see little brick factories all around this area.

"It is more expensive to build earthquake-proof structures," he added. And the vast majority of people in Sichuan Province are anything but rich.
The Science Behind the Quake
Earthquake activity is nothing new in Beichuan.
"We have shown evidence for surface-rupturing earthquakes along the Beichuan fault since 12,000-13,000 years ago," Ellis and colleagues reported last summer.
Speaking with National Geographic News, Ellis said, "Ultimately, the [2008] earthquake is related to the continuing and inexorable collision of India with Asia, which is occurring at a rate of about 20 to 22 milimeters [just under an inch] per year."
This collision started more than 50 million years ago, when the tectonic plate beneath India crashed into the Eurasian plate. (Watch how the plates slammed into each other.)
"The Himalayas and all of Tibet was created by this collision," Ellis added.
As the Indian plate continues its slow-motion crash into Asia—sometimes in jerks marked by earthquakes—it is pushing the entire Tibetan Plateau northward.
"This earthquake was the Tibetan mountains moving east over the plains of Chengdu [the capital of Sichuan Province]," said Roger Bilham, a geoscientist at the University of Colorado who was not involved in the July 2007 study.
Not Just Sichuan's Problem
Study co-author Ellis said that, as the Tibetan Plateau moves northward, "the interior parts of Tibet are collapsing, rather like a soufflé taken out of the oven into cold air."
Faults along the southern, Himalayan edge of Tibet present hazards as great as those underlying the Sichuan temblor, Ellis said.
"Risk associated with the loss of collateral and lives is very high along the Himalaya, because so many people live there or immediately downstream," Ellis added.
"The risk is similarly high in Sichuan [to the east], because of the population and, like India and Nepal, the relatively poor building standards," he said.
And as India continues to pound into Tibet, "it is still creating new fault lines"—and new dangers.

As Asia Reels From Twin Disasters, World Vision Expands Response

As the Asia region reels from two massive disasters, Christian aid agency World Vision is on the ground, providing emergency aid to survivors of both the Myanmar cyclone and China earthquake. As the death toll from Monday’s 7.9 earthquake continues to rise, World Vision offices close to the epicenter have dispatched a relief and assessment team to provide immediate supplies, such as blankets and tents, to 10,000 people, with more supplies on the way. The agency has appealed for $1 million to support the initial response.
Sichuan province, where the quake centered, is a densely populated region, increasing the chance that the death toll could climb higher.
In Myanmar, World Vision will also be providing aid to nearly half a million cyclone survivors if it can get the additional funds, expertise and supplies to the affected areas. Staff on the ground are already seeing cases of waterborne diseases, and the health status of children is of critical concern.
The international aid agency’s local team has been working around the clock to assist more than 100,000 children and adults with things like water, clothing and temporary shelters.
Steve Goudswaard, World Vision’s cyclone response manager, said, “We are now getting relief supplies into the delta area where there is staggering need. If we can maintain the access to survivors and increase our supplies, we will be able to reach almost half a million people.”
An operation base has been set up in the eastern part of the delta in a town called Pyapon — about a four-hour drive from Yangon — through which aid is beginning to flow. World Vision staff have been trucking emergency kits, assembled by staff in Yangon, down to the base. Pyapon is close to three of the worst affected townships in the delta region.
The aid deliveries began to move after the government permitted access to those in need. World Vision has complete control of the supply and distribution of its aid.
Although relief goods are being bought in-country at this point, World Vision hopes to bring in aid flights from one of its global warehouses in Dubai in the next few days — as soon as it receives clearance from the government of Myanmar.
The current short-term emergency response phase will be followed by a two- to three-year rehabilitation and reconstruction phase. World Vision plans to increase the number of its staff from the current 580 and provide specialized training to ensure an effective response.
The public can donate to one or both of these disaster responses by visiting www.worldvision.org or calling 1.888.56.CHILD.
World Vision is a Christian humanitarian organization dedicated to working with children, families and their communities worldwide to reach their full potential by tackling the causes of poverty and injustice. World Vision serves all people, regardless of religion, race, ethnicity or gender. Visit www.worldvision.org/press.
Source: World Vision

World Vision rushes aid to 10,000 China quake survivors

MISSISSAUGA, ON, May 14 /CNW/ - World Vision is rushing aid to 10,000earthquake survivors in southwestern China, including blankets and tents forchildren and families left homeless. Children, who were buried or trapped in collapsing schools and homes,comprised a high percentage of the casualties. "This disaster is so tragic,especially for children. Many of those who survived the quake learned thattheir parents and classmates had not," said World Vision Canada managerAlice Chin Ho. Ho says that World Vision has more than 700 local staff in China whobegan to mobilize soon after news of the quake broke on May 12. An emergencyassessment team is travelling to the stricken area to assess damages and bringin preliminary supplies. The team is experienced in disaster relief, mostrecently providing aid to thousands of people affected by severe winterblizzards and to survivors of the March earthquake that struck Xinjiang innorthwestern China. Canadians have been responding generously to World Vision's appeal for$100,000 for emergency relief, says Ho. "World Vision donors worldwide sponsor75,000 children in China, including 10,500 sponsored by Canadians. We arethankful that none of these children were affected by the quake, but ourdonors and others have been calling in to ask what they can do for childrenand families who lost everything. It seems that China holds a special place inthe hearts of many Canadians." Those wishing to help can visit WorldVision.ca or call 1-800-268-5528(English), 1-800-363-5021 (French) or 1-800-268-2776 (Chinese). World Vision is a Christian relief, development and advocacy organizationdedicated to working with children, families and communities to overcomepoverty and injustice. World Vision serves all people regardless of religion,race, ethnicity or gender. For more information, please visitwww.worldvision.ca.

PHOTOS: CHINA EARTHQUAKE(BBC & National Geographic)

Photographs from BBC and National Geographic sites

May 12, 2008—A student sits in the shambles of his school classroom in Guancheng village in Chongqing after a magnitude 7.8 earthquake rattled Sichuan Province, China, on May 12, 2008. The temblor, which struck around 2:30 p.m., killed almost 9,000 people and trapped nearly 900 students under the rubble of their school in Juyuan, about 62 miles (100 kilometers) from the epicenter, according to state media reports. Students were also buried under five other destroyed schools in the city of Deyang. Fifty of the Juyuan students were confirmed dead, according to the state-run news agency Xinhua, which also quoted two girls saying they had escaped because they had "run faster than others." A chemical plant that collapsed in Shifang also buried hundreds of people and spilled more than 80 tons of toxic liquid ammonia from the site, Xinhua reported. The last major earthquake hit China in 2003, when a magnitude 6.8 quake killed 268 people west of Xinjiang.

Interactive Map: The damage» View

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/05/12/world/05132008_CHINA_MAP.html

'No hope' for children buried in China quake

By Edward Wong
Published: May 13, 2008

DUJIANGYAN, China: The children who were considered fortunate escaped with a broken bone or a severed limb. The others, hundreds of them, were carried out to be buried, and their remaining classmates lay crushed beneath the rubble of the schoolhouse.
"There's no hope for them," said Lu Zhiqing, 58, as she watched uniformed rescue workers trudge through mud and rain toward the mound of bricks and concrete that had once been a school. "There's no way anyone's still alive in there."
A man and woman walked away from the rubble together. He sheltered her under an umbrella as she screamed, "My child is dead! Dead!"
As dawn crept across this shattered town on Tuesday, it illuminated rows and rows of apartment blocks collapsed into piles, bodies wedged among the debris, newly homeless families and their neighbors clustered on the roadside, shielding themselves from the downpour with plastic tarps.
The earthquake originated here in the lush farmfields and river valleys of Sichuan Province, killing almost 10,000 people and trapping thousands more.

One of the most jarring tragedies of the disaster was the school collapse in a suburb of Dujiangyan. At least several hundred children were killed, perhaps as many as 900. Prime Minister Wen Jiabao flew here on Monday to survey the destruction, but he was powerless to ease the suffering of the survivors.
In the center of town, a woman said she had called local government officials 10 times to plead for help in rescuing her son and mother, but no one had come.
So on Tuesday morning, she could do little but stand crying in front of her collapsed apartment building. Her 5-month-old son was still buried in there, as was her 56-year-old mother.
"I was outside when the earthquake hit," said the woman, Wang Xiaoni, 26. "I ran back even while the ground was still shaking."
She shook her head, tears streaming down her cheeks. "Who's going to help them now?"
More than 10 people had been killed in that building alone, she said. She pointed across the street to a young man in a white tracksuit picking through the debris from another apartment building. "His entire family is in there," she said.
People walked up and down the street taking photos with cell phones and digital cameras. "This isn't even the worst-off area," one man said.
One block over, the façade of a white six-story residential building had sheared off, leaving one side of the apartments open to the air. Each living room had a television set untouched by the earthquake. But in the cascade of rubble at the foot of the building, a lifeless head and arm stuck out of the debris, and another body could be seen on the other side of the mound of rubble.
Across the street, a young man and his older sister walked out of an apartment building with a red duffel bag, two pillows and a thick wool blanket. They stacked the bedding on the sidewalk.
"Everything in the apartment was destroyed," said the man, Ji Yongtao, 27, waving a hand up at the second floor. "It was frightening. We need to find a place to live. We'll spend the night in a building that was recently built, or on the first floor somewhere. We're not going back up there."
Dozens of people had gathered on the sidewalk by a major intersection down the street. They were constructing a huge tent, pulling a tarp over upright wooden poles they had lashed together. This would be their home for the day, and maybe the night, and maybe the next few days and nights.
Busloads of soldiers rode past in the street. But there was no immediate help for the people.
"We left with nothing but the clothes we're wearing," said Hu Huojin, 38, cradling her 6-year-old son in her arms. "We don't dare stay in our homes. We'll return when we're told it's safe to go back. Otherwise, we don't dare live there."
She gazed out at the wet street.
"I can't even remember how long the ground shook," she said. "It was enormous. We've never experienced an earthquake before."
An elderly couple stood under a store awning on the edge of the tent village. The man held the family dog, Chou Mer, but they had not seen their son, a cab driver, since he left home hours before the earthquake.
"We still haven't heard from him," said the mother, Yang Limei, 58. "Last night, we kept calling him, but we couldn't get through. I don't know what to do. We can't even wait for him at home."

Her husband, Chui Xianchao, 63, said, "The walls are still standing, but everything else fell to the ground."
Ambulances roared by on the way to the hospitals in Chengdu, the provincial capital. Another bus rolled past carrying about 20 soldiers.
The army had appropriated public buses throughout the region, and men wearing green fatigues peered out the windows at the homeless standing in the street.
"No one's come to help us yet," Chui said. "Those soldiers are going somewhere else."
A few miles to the south, in front of the collapsed school, a half-dozen soldiers linked hands to form a human blockade in front of the rubble. Two women tried to push their way through. The soldiers did not budge.
"There are still children in there, and we can't help them if you keep trying to get in," one soldier said.(International Herald Tribune)