China has launched an “all-out” rescue operation in Tibet after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake killed at least 16 people, injured dozens and destroyed hundreds of homes, state media reported.
Rescue crews used torches to search through the darkness inside some of the more than 300 buildings that collapsed in the quake, according to footage released by Xinhua.
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Videos broadcast by state broadcaster CCTV showed diners rushing from restaurants and goods tumbling from shaking supermarket shelves as the tremor struck. CCTV reported that 65 people had been injured.
One resident told local media that her family had just gone to bed when the walls began to shake and objects toppled inside the house. They “rushed outside without even taking the time to get dressed,” she said.
Residents “are afraid to return to their homes,” she added. “They set up tents along the roadside or spent the night in their cars.”
A man told the Beijing News that the “very strong” earthquake made his home “creaking and rattling”.
“I was asleep when it hit. Everyone has run outside now and is too afraid to go back in. I’m currently driving to an open area to sleep in my car,” he said.
CCTV footage also showed helmeted emergency workers carrying an injured person while shining flashlights across damaged buildings, several of which had lost their roofs.
Tibet is largely inaccessible to foreign journalists, leaving Chinese authorities as the only official source of information about the disaster.
Firefighters searching through damaged buildings (CCTV via Reuters)
President Xi Jinping said the earthquake had caused “significant casualties” in a remote, high-altitude area where freezing conditions could complicate rescue efforts.
“(We) must go all-out to carry out search and rescue operations and do our utmost to treat the injured, so as to minimise casualties,” Xinhua quoted Mr Xi as saying.
He ordered authorities to provide immediate assistance to residents and send rescue equipment to the affected area without delay.
The epicentre was located in a mountainous region about 190 kilometres (120 miles) east-northeast of Nagqu and 390 kilometres northeast of the regional capital, Lhasa, the US Geological Survey said.
The quake struck at 10:33 pm (1433 GMT) yesterday at a shallow depth of about 10 kilometres.
Lhawang Dagpo, a local official in Maru township, where the earthquake was centred, said the force of the tremor left cracks in the walls of his office, Xinhua reported.
Electricity and telecommunications services were disrupted in the county seat, the agency said.
More than 1,600 people have been mobilised in Baqing County to support the relief operation, CCTV reported.
The municipal fire and rescue brigade sent 25 vehicles and 110 personnel, while the Nagqu Armed Police Detachment dispatched 225 officers and soldiers along with 18 vehicles, CCTV said.
Emergency supplies delivered to the area included 1,000 prefabricated houses, 3,239 tents, four generators and 1,000 flashlights, it added.
CCTV showed damaged buildings in Baqen County
Earthquakes frequently strike the region, where vast mountainous areas and harsh weather can make rescue operations especially difficult.
In January 2025, at least 126 people were killed by an earthquake in Tibet’s rural Tingri county.
The disaster came little more than a year after an earthquake in remote Gansu province in northwest China killed at least 148 people in December 2023, according to state media.
That was China’s deadliest earthquake since 2014, when more than 600 people died in the southwestern province of Yunnan.
A massive tremor in Sichuan province in 2008 killed or left about 90,000 people missing, including roughly 5,000 schoolchildren.
