Earthquake News.

First Burma, with as many as a million and a half dead from the cyclone and its aftermath of disease and starvation, and now China.

China has perhaps the most deadly earthquakes in the world. Literally millions have died there in earthquakes since recorded history's worst, in 1556, when an estimated 850,000 people died.

Perhaps 5,000 have died from this latest one in one county. More than 900 students are trapped in a single school when it collapsed. The tremors were felt as far away as Thailand and Vietnam. Who knows how many more have died?

The worst one in China in modern times was the 1976 Tangshan earthquake where an estimated 240,000 people died (although some estimates have up to 600,000). That quake registered at a 7.8. The death toll, as the article notes, was covered up for a time by the Chinese government.

This one has been registered at a 7.8 on the Richter scale. Eighty percent of the buildings in Beichuan County have been leveled.
_____

Update: This earthquake's power is about on the level with the Tangshan earthquake. The death toll has been upped to 7,600. I'd say that's probably conservative, though perhaps not as severe as the 1976 quake in terms of lives lost. This one happened in the afternoon, not at night. The shock could be felt as far away as Beijing, 960 miles away.
_____

Update II: The death toll has risen to 8,500.
_____