YUXI, China — Many people of this city in southwester
China spent Saturday night in tents, too scared to sleep in their homes after
an earthquake which killed 188 people early that morning.
Countless homes were destroyed and lots of people
became homeless after the earthquake which is believed to have a magnitude of
7.
The quake was not as serious as the 7.9-magnitude
earthquake in 2008 that left more than 70,000 people dead in the Wenchuan area.
But villagers who work in Chengdu, about 100 miles away, hurried back home
Sunday morning, many on foot, the lucky ones on motorbikes, to check on their
homes.
Song Yuanqing, 43, a worker, arrived back after a
22-hour trip and found his house was still there but had already been very
unstable(摇摇欲坠). “We would like to do something, but we
can’t do anything,” Mr. Song said as he sat with neighbors around an outdoor
fire built by the village leader in his backyard.
In all, the government sent about 7,000 soldiers and
People’s Armed Police officers to the earthquake-hit area. By Saturday evening,
there were so many rescue workers in the area that the government asked
volunteers to stop coming.
Li Keqiang, China’s prime minister, flew to the area
and slept in a tent on Saturday evening in Lushan County.
The earthquake shook Sichuan Province at 8 a.m., when
people were getting up a little later than usual because schools and
universities were closed.
“We were just getting up and getting dressed in our
dormitory when the building shook, and I looked outside from our window and saw
a row of houses had collapsed,” Xu Yan, 22, a student at the Agricultural
University in Ya’an, said in a telephone interview. “I had never flew down
the stairs faster.”
The Chinese government said early Sunday that the
death toll was 174, and about 5,700 people had been injured.
The earthquake was also felt in Chengdu, one of
China’s biggest cities and the capital of Sichuan Province. People described
water getting out of home aquariums and things like balls falling to the floor.
In the town of Longmen, another hard-hit area near
Ya’an, a local man, Zhang Yan, said 90 percent of the buildings had collapsed.
“About 100 people died around here,” Ms. Zhang said in
a telephone interview. “Rescue teams have not yet arrived. There is no water or
electricity.”
In the 2008 quake, many schools of poor quality
collapsed and killed thousands of students. This time, many people also
expressed their worries about students on their micro-blogs.
Sichuan Province is also one of China’s best-known
hometowns for pandas, and at the Bifengxia reserve, about six miles north of
Ya’an, workers said that 20 pandas in the park were safe. “We examined the
panda area after the quake, and they were not affected,” said Chen Yong, an
officer of the reserve.
1.When did the quake take place in Ya’an?
On_______________________.
A.Saturday
morning B.Sunday
morning
C.Saturday
night D.Sunday night
2.Why did many people hurriy home after the
earthquake.
A.They wanted
to provide rescue to the hit area and give other people a helping hand as
volunteers.
B.They wanted
to find out the situation of their home.
C.They felt it
too dangerous to stay where they had been.
D.There weren’t enough soldiers in the hit-area.
3.What does the underlined sentence mean?
A.Xu Yan didn’t make it through the stairs.
B.Xu Yan get
out of the dorm quickly.
C.Xu Yan felt the
earthquake shaking the stair.
D.Xu Yan was
scared that he wouldn’t be able to catch up with the stair.
4.Which of the following is NOT true.
A.Tens of
thousands of students were killed in Ya’an.
B.The
earthquake also influenced some other cities.
C.The
government took very quick actions.
D.Most
buildings has collapsed in Longmen.
5.Where would you most probably read this passage?
A.Reader.
B.A History of
China’s Earthquakes
C.How to
Survive(求生) in an Earthquake
D.China Weekly