Magnitude-7.0 Earthquake Kills at Least 16 in Remote Tibetan County, Dozens Injured

BEIJING — A magnitude-7.0 earthquake tore through a remote, high-altitude stretch of China's Tibet Autonomous Region late Thursday, killing at least 16 people, injuring dozens more and collapsing hundreds of homes in one of the most powerful tremors to hit the Tibetan plateau since a deadlier quake killed 126 people in the same region last year.

The quake struck at 10:33 p.m. local time in Baqen County, part of Nagqu City, with its epicenter about 191 kilometers (119 miles) east-northeast of the city of Nagqu at a depth of 18 kilometers, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. China's own seismological network recorded a shallower depth of roughly 10 kilometers, a routine discrepancy between the two monitoring systems rather than a sign of disagreement over the quake's size. The area lies more than 300 kilometers north of Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, in a thinly populated expanse of grassland and mountain used mainly for yak and sheep herding.

Toll climbs through the night

By 1 p.m. Friday, 16 people had been confirmed dead and 76 injured, according to the Nagqu municipal government's information office, as reported by Xinhua, China's official state news agency. The figures rose through the night as rescue teams reached outlying settlements; earlier Xinhua dispatches had put the injury count at 54 and then 65. The Associated Press, citing the same local officials, reported that at least 339 homes and 20 livestock shelters had collapsed across the sparsely built, high-altitude terrain, where houses are often constructed of mud brick or unreinforced stone and are especially vulnerable to strong shaking.

It was "the biggest earthquake in the region in the last five years," China's state broadcaster CCTV said, a measure of the shock in a part of the plateau better known for its yak herds and monasteries than for seismic destruction.

Communications and power were only partly restored by Friday after the quake knocked out signal to parts of Baqen County. Railway authorities halted trains passing through the area, and rockfalls forced the closure of a stretch of National Highway 317 to all but emergency and rescue vehicles while crews cleared debris. Baqen is a sparsely populated county of nomadic and semi-nomadic Tibetan herding communities whose livelihoods depend on yaks, sheep and goats grazed across the high plateau; the collapse of livestock sheds alongside homes points to losses that will be felt well beyond the immediate death toll, in a region where winter fodder stores and shelter for animals are as critical to survival as housing for people.

Beijing moves fast, and with money

Chinese President Xi Jinping, in instructions relayed through Xinhua, ordered an all-out search-and-rescue effort for anyone still missing and prompt treatment for the injured, while urging officials to prevent landslides and other secondary disasters given the area's thin air and freezing night temperatures. Premier Li Qiang called for solid disaster-prevention and response work, and the Ministry of Emergency Management mobilized rescue resources, Xinhua said.

More than 5,000 personnel were working the front lines by Friday afternoon on search and rescue, medical treatment, temporary shelter and the distribution of supplies, with an emergency command headquarters set up on site. The national fire and rescue force separately sent 350 rescuers and 83 vehicles, along with drones for aerial damage assessment. China raised its national earthquake emergency response a notch, from Level IV to Level III, and activated a parallel Level-IV natural disaster relief response, according to Xinhua.

The government also moved quickly on financing. The Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Emergency Management jointly released 50 million yuan for emergency relief, while the National Development and Reform Commission earmarked a further 30 million yuan from the central budget for reconstruction of damaged infrastructure and public facilities — a combined 80 million yuan, or roughly $11 million. The Red Cross Society of China dispatched its own team and some 3,800 sets of relief supplies, including tents, heaters, quilts and hygiene kits, while the China Charity Federation allocated an additional 3 million yuan for emergency rescue work.

Herders face a cold, uncertain recovery

Nagqu prefecture sits at an average elevation above 4,500 meters, among the highest inhabited areas on Earth, and Xinhua said intermittent snow was forecast across the quake zone over the following three days — a complication for both rescue crews and the herding families who lost homes and, in some cases, livestock sheds. Authorities said seismic, meteorological and emergency-management agencies were jointly monitoring aftershocks and keeping watch on mountainsides, reservoirs, hydropower stations, rivers and structurally unsafe buildings for signs of landslides or other secondary hazards. Police and transport officials said they had inspected more than 1,700 kilometers of roads, 201 bridges and 324 culverts, identifying 11 potential hazards and clearing rockfall from seven road sections to keep access open for aid convoys.

The quake is the second major, deadly tremor to strike the Tibetan plateau in less than two years. A magnitude-6.8 to 7.1 earthquake killed at least 126 people and injured roughly 200 in Dingri County, in Tibet's Shigatse prefecture, in January 2025. Both quakes reflect the region's exposure along the seismically active boundary where the Indian tectonic plate continues to push into the Eurasian plate, a collision that built the Himalayas and keeps the plateau prone to strong, shallow earthquakes.

For now, officials have not given a timeline for when search-and-rescue operations will formally end or when displaced residents might return to rebuilt homes. With snow forecast and the death toll still described by Chinese authorities as preliminary, rescue teams were expected to keep working through the weekend, and the figures for the dead, the injured and the destroyed were likely to keep moving before they settle.

No foreign government or United Nations agency had issued a statement on the earthquake as of Friday, and China has not solicited international assistance, consistent with its practice after the 2025 Dingri quake and other recent domestic disasters. Xizang remains among the most tightly controlled regions in China, and foreign journalists and aid workers face significant restrictions on independent access, meaning most of the detail emerging about the damage and the response is coming through state channels rather than on-the-ground international reporting.