Rescue crews combed through the rubble while emergency survival gear including coats and tents arrived to help the thousands of people who fled their homes.“This 7.1 rating is very strong, but the death and injury situation is not severe,” Zhang Yongjiu, the head of Xinjiang Earthquake Administration, told a news conference.The quake’s epicenter was in a mountainous area about 3,000 meters (9,800 feet) above sea level, Zhang said.In the village of Yamansu, about 115 people were staying in a Communist Party meeting hall, their bedding neatly rolled up on Wednesday morning on top of five long rows of metal bed frames. Medical staff were on hand to check on older residents.A grandmother fed one of her grandchildren on one of the beds, while an older one slurped instant noodles.Outside, men chatted around a large metal wood-burning cooker with a stove pipe, two wearing chef’s toques. Chunks of meat and vegetables in large plastic and metal containers sat on two weathered desks set up on the ground outside.A light layer of snow covered the frozen ground as temperatures remained well below freezing, although the sunshine brought people outside.The quake hit shortly after 2 a.m. on Tuesday. By evening, authorities said three people had died and five were injured, two seriously.State broadcaster CCTV said 1,104 aftershocks, including five that were above magnitude 5.0, were recorded as of 8:00 a.m. Wednesday. The largest registered at magnitude 5.7.Among the buildings damaged, 47 houses had collapsed, the government of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region posted on its official Weibo social media account Tuesday.Officials said most of the houses that collapsed were in remote areas and were built by residents. Newer public housing built by the government did not collapse.Footage broadcast by CCTV showed staff at Aksu’s train station ordering passengers out of the waiting hall in a speedy but not panicked manner.Associated Press journalists saw some walls cracked or partially collapsed in the empty Aksu country village of Youkakeyamansu, a name transliterated in Mandarin from Uyghur. All residents had been evacuated to a shelter.
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