HERE IT IS....
Contact made with quake-struck Wenchuan
MORE than 30,000 people are now safe in shelters in Wenchuan County, Sichuan Province, the epicenter of yesterday’s 7.8-magnitude quake, said the head of the local government early today.
Wang Bin, Party secretary of Wenchuan, was contacted at 1:15am today via a satellite phone call. It was the county’s first contact with the outside world and came almost 11 hours after all telecommunications lines were cut due to the earthquake at 2:28pm yesterday.
Wang said most of the houses in the county had collapsed and residents chose to stay away from their homes out of fear of aftershocks.
Wenchuan needs tents, food, doctors, medicine and satellite communication facilities, Wang added.
The scale of damage in the nearby counties of Yinxiu, Xuankou and Wolong remained unknown due to damaged communications and transport networks.
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/sp/article/2008/200805/20080513/article_359375.htm
Wenchuan is reported to have a population of 118,000.
only 30,000+ are in shelters in Wenchuan
where are the rest of the people in Wenchuan?
The closest town to the epicentral region is the town of Wenchuan itself, which lies on the Minjiang River. Though 30 miles (50 km) away from the epicenter, this town appears to be close to the fault structure itself, so damage is expected to be significant. Wenchuan is reported to have a population of 118,000.