Death Toll Rises to 180 in China Deadly Quake – Report

BEIJING, April 21 (RIA Novosti) – The death toll from a massive earthquake that hit southwest China’s Sichuan province has risen to 180 people and over 11,000 others are injured, Xinhua news agency reported on Sunday, referring to the provincial emergency response command center.

The 7.0-magnitude quake struck the Lushan county of Sichuan's Ya'an city at 8:02 a.m. Saturday Beijing Time, according to the China Earthquake Networks Center.

Some 1,165 aftershocks have been detected, with the biggest one registering 5.8 magnitude.

Twenty-four people are reported missing.

Ya'an has a population of 1.53 million and is known as the hometown of the giant panda. It is about 140 kilometers (87 miles) away from the provincial capital Chengdu.

In May 2008, the Sichuan province was struck by an 8-magnitude earthquake, the worst tremor to hit China in three decades, killing some 70,000 people and displacing 10 million. China's direct economic losses from the earthquake exceeded one trillion yuan (around $150 billion).

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