Selected bits from:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article3916648.ece
900 students 'buried' in China earthquake
Premier Wen Jiabao left Beijing and tried to reach the epicentre after the tremor rocked the region at 0628 GMT at a depth of 18 miles. The decision to send such a senior leader was the first hint that officials feared a high casualty toll in a region with a large Tibetan population that has seen anti-Chinese unrest in recent weeks.
Selected bits from:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/13/world/asia/13china.html?ref=world
900 Trapped After Quake, China State Media Reports
BEIJING — A powerful earthquake struck a mountainous region of western China on Monday, killing at least 107 people and trapping more than 900 students beneath a collapsed high school as tremors shook buildings for hundreds of miles, according to interviews and reports in China’s state media.
Early Monday evening, Xinhua also flashed an emergency report from Dujiangyan describing that nearly 900 students were feared trapped after a high school collapsed. Most of the telephones in the city were not functioning, and the Xinhua report could not be independently verified.
Efforts to reach people near the epicenter of the bigger quake in western China were hindered by the damaged telephone system. But receptionists at different hotels in Chengdu said the earthquake appeared not to have caused any major problems in the city. Xinhua showed photographs of minor flooding caused by damage to an underground water pipe, but, as yet, the city seemed largely undamaged.