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China's Picturesque Tibet Autonomous Region: News & Images

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Lots of earthquakes lately. I hope everyone is healthy and safe.
 
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Sh*t, there are casualties. It's not good at all.

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Magnitude-6.7 earthquake hits near India-Myanmar-Bangladesh border

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PHOTO: The earthquake caused damage to a six-storey building in Imphal. (Instagram: Deepak Shijagurumayum)

Key points:
  • Tremor hit 29 kilometres west of Imphal and was 55 kilometres deep, said USGS
  • Reports six people have died in India's Imphal, three of heart attacks in Bangladesh
  • About a 200 people were injured and several buildings damaged, including the hospital, police said
A powerful magnitude-6.7 earthquake has struck South Asia, killing at least nine people and injuring nearly 200, with efforts to rescue those trapped in rubble hampered by severed power supplies and telecommunication links.

The US Geological Survey (USGS) said the tremor hit at 4:35am (local time), 29 kilometres west of the Indian city of Imphal, the capital of Manipur state which borders Myanmar and Bangladesh.

It said the quake was 55 kilometres deep and was initially reported to have struck inside Myanmar as a magnitude-6.8 quake.

The quake struck while many residents were asleep, and roofs and staircases of some buildings collapsed in the city of about 270,000 people.

"It was like being tossed around in a frying pan," said Joy Thanglian. "Then we ran outside."

Police and hospitals in Imphal said the toll had reached six dead, with 100 people injured, 33 of them seriously.

Rescue workers battled to find construction workers believed to have been buried beneath the rubble of a building under construction. They were unsure how many might be trapped.

Meanwhile, media in Bangladesh reported three people died of heart attacks, with police saying at least 90 were injured.

Police in Dhaka said 40 people were being treated at a major hospital in the Bangladeshi capital, including one university student who jumped from a fourth-floor balcony and was in a critical condition.

Residents near the epicentre said people fled their homes and power was down across Imphal.

Several buildings had been damaged, including the hospital, police said.

Photographs of the damage done to Ema Keithel, the main market in Imphal, showed concrete sheared from the wire frames of large pillars.

"It was the biggest earthquake we've felt in Imphal," disaster response worker Kanarjit Kangujam said.

People in Bangladesh and Nepal ran from their homes, and the quake was also felt as far away as the Myanmar capital Yangon, about 1,176 kms to the south, residents said.

The tremors were also felt as far away as India's Kolkata, about 600 kilometres awayin the Indian state of West Bengal, where buildings shook.

An official at Myanmar's Meteorological Department in Naypyidaw said there were no reports of damage or casualties on the Myanmar side of the border.

Quake sparks regional panic
There were similar scenes of people fleeing buildings in the northeast Indian city of Guwahati, the main commercial city of the mineral-rich state of Assam, where an AFP correspondent said residents were "in a state of shock" after being woken by the shaking.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted that he had spoken to local authorities in Assam about the impact of the quake.

In its initial assessment, USGS said "some casualties and damage are possible and the impact should be relatively localised".

It said buildings in the area were largely "highly vulnerable to earthquake shaking".

USGS issued a yellow alert for casualties and damage, with a 35 per cent likelihood of between one and 10 deaths from the tremor.

India's seven north-eastern states, joined to the rest of the country by a narrow sliver of land, are located in an area of frequent seismic activity.

The border region is remote and sparsely populated on the Myanmar side.

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it was scarry as hell. I was sleeping in 4th flour. no way to run.
 
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China's Tibet sees record number of air passengers in 2015

January 9, 2016

China's Tibet in southwest China saw a record 3.63 million air passengers in 2015, up 15.2 percent from the previous year, regional civil aviation statistics show.

The plateau region opened 13 new air routes last year, bringing its operating routes to 63. The number of cities linked to Tibet via air rose by seven to reach 40.

Five airports in Tibet handled more than 36,000 landings and take-offs and cargo throughput of 29,000 tons in 2015, an increase of 16.8 percent and 16.3 percent year-on-year, respectively.

Tibet's civil aviation industry has been growing rapidly with a total investment of more than 3 billion yuan (457 million U.S. dollars), becoming an important driver for the regional economy.

During the 13th Five-Year (2016-2020) period, Tibet will develop air express routes between the regional capital Lhasa and Chengdu, capital of neighboring Sichuan Province, and will open more air routes to other domestic cities, according to a regional civil aviation official.

Tibet will also encourage airline companies to open routes between Lhasa and Southeast and South Asian countries, said the official.
 
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An indication of growing wealth of the Tibetan folks

The Gross Regional Product (GRP) of Tibet rocketed from 129 million yuan in 1951 to 70.1 billion yuan in 2012, representing an annual growth of 8.5 percent on average. The per capita GRP reached 22,900 yuan. Since 1994 Tibet has realized double-digit growth for 19 consecutive years, with an annual growth rate of 12.7 percent on average.
Govt. White Papers - china.org.cn

In Tibet alone there are "Five airports .." as abovementioned
 
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An indication of growing wealth of the Tibetan folks

The Gross Regional Product (GRP) of Tibet rocketed from 129 million yuan in 1951 to 70.1 billion yuan in 2012, representing an annual growth of 8.5 percent on average. The per capita GRP reached 22,900 yuan. Since 1994 Tibet has realized double-digit growth for 19 consecutive years, with an annual growth rate of 12.7 percent on average.
Govt. White Papers - china.org.cn

In Tibet alone there are "Five airports .." as abovementioned

The current 13th Five Year Plan will ensure further inland growth. Anticipate China's Xizhang and China's Xinjiang to be very different from today around 2020.
 
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Sichuan-Tibet railway work picks up speed

By LI YANG,Palden Nyima (China Daily)

Updated: 2016-01-30 03:06

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1,629-km line perched on high mountains to be complete in early 2030s

China will accelerate the construction of a 1,629-kilometer Sichuan-Tibet railway starting this year, heads of the two regions' governments confirmed.

"The government will start a preliminary survey and research of the Kangting-Lyingchi railway project this year, and accelerate the construction of Sichuan-Tibet railway in the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-20) period," Losang Jamcan, chairman of the Tibet autonomous region government, said at the fourth session of the 10th People's Congress of Tibet in Lhasa on Wednesday.

Yin Li, acting governor of Sichuan, sent out similar message in the fourth session of the 12th People's Congress of Sichuan in Chengdu earlier.

The railway connecting Lhasa and Chengdu will be divided into three sections from west to east: Lhasa-Lyingchi, Lyingchi-Kangting, and Kangting-Chengdu.

Nearly 1,000 km of it will be in Tibet. Construction of the west and the east sections began last year. The whole project is expected to be completed in the early 2030s.

Perched at over 3,000 meters above sea level, and with more than 74 percent of its length running on bridges or in tunnels, the railway will meander through the mountains, the highest of which is over 7,000 meters.

It will cross the major rivers Minjiang, Jinshajiang and Yarlung Zangbo, said Lin Shijin, a senior civil engineer at China Railway Corp.

"The accumulated height it will climb reaches more than 14,000 meters, and it will cross many fault zones," he added. "It's like the largest rollercoaster in the world. With a designed service life of 100 years, it is believed to be one of the most difficult railway projects to build on Earth."

"It will cost at least 100 million yuan ($15.87 million) per kilometer, similar to the cost of high-speed railways on plains," said Zhao Jinxue, a rail construction risk appraiser with an insurance company in Chengdu.

The Sichuan-Tibet railway presents its builders multiple difficulties to overcome, such as avalanches, landslides, earthquakes, terrestrial heat, karst caves and underground streams, Lin said. "Yet, it is still a worthwhile project."

To travel from Chengdu to Lhasa currently takes 42 hours by train and three days by road. The rail line will shorten the travel time to less than 15 hours.

"I hope the railway can be finished as quickly as possible. Then, I'll take the train back home. It is more economical, safer and comfortable than airplanes," said Qiao Liang, a Chengdu businessman in Lhasa, who regularly commutes between the two places.

The southeast is the most populous region in Tibet, and the west of Sichuan is the least developed region of the province. The two regions are filled with breathtaking natural views and fascinating ethnic cultures.

"The railway will effectively boost tourism, and bring a new Shangri-La to the world and tangible revenue to local people," said He Ping, a tourism agency manager in Chengdu.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2016-01/30/content_23316800.htm
 
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