Classes resume in Yingjiang

Xinhua, March 15, 2011

A county in Yunnan Province is watching out for secondary disasters as students returned to school yesterday, four days after a 5.8-magnitude earthquake jolted the area.

Pai Mudong teaches a class as students returned to school yesterday, four days after an earthquake struck in Yingjiang County, Yunnan Province.

About 75 percent of Yingjiang County's 31,141 primary and junior high school students returned to school yesterday, said Li Shaobo, the county's education chief.

He said 143 primary schools and 15 junior high schools reopened. The remaining five schools seriously damaged by the quake will resume classes next week, Li added.

Li said the education authority had examined all school buildings, and ensured adequate supplies of tents, food and quilts for boarders.

About 6,500 square meters of prefabricated housing had been set up to replace unsafe school buildings, he said.

The quake killed 25 people dead and injured 314 others in Yingjiang. It toppled 1,039 houses and seriously damaged another 4,994 homes.

Though the provincial earthquake administration has not forecast more powerful quakes in the region, county authorities are on alert for secondary disasters, said Yang Mei, Yingjiang's land and resources chief.

He said the bureau was monitoring for landslides and mudrock flows.