4 dead in western China quake; 54 hurt

BEIJING — A strong earthquake that hit a sparsely populated, mountainous area of western China killed at least four people and injured 54 others, including schoolchildren in a stampede, officials said today.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the magnitude-5.9 quake had a depth of 9 miles. It struck in the late afternoon about 20 miles from the town of Kangding in Sichuan province. China’s seismological agency said the quake’s magnitude was 6.3.

The four dead included a woman in her 70s who was struck by a falling windowpane, the official Xinhua News Agency and state broadcaster CCTV said, citing Chen Yunbing, a doctor at the region’s Ganzi People’s Hospital.

A stampede at a primary school in Tagong town during the quake injured 42 children, according to Xinhua.

A total of 30 homes collapsed and 2,630 suffered serious damage, the Sichuan information office said.

Western China is regularly hit by earthquakes, and reports said Saturday’s quake could be felt in the Sichuan provincial capital of Chengdu on the plains below the Himalayan foothills. Sichuan was struck by a magnitude-7.9 quake in May 2008 that left nearly 90,000 people dead.