Nine people injured in earthquake in Gongxian

Nine people were injured in a 5.6-magnitude earthquake that hit Gongxian, a county near Yibin, Sichuan province, at 10:17 am on Thursday.

With a depth of eight kilometers, the earthquake was also felt by residents in Yibin, 46 kilometers from Gongxian. The Sichuan provincial capital of Chengdu is a further 277 kilometers away.

"I felt the road shaking when I was standing on the bank of the Yangtze River with a delegation of visitors from outside Yibin," said Hu Jianjun, an information officer with the Nanxi district government of Yibin.

Soon after the earthquake, government workers headed for the quake zone, paying house calls to evaluate the damage to residential houses.

"Some houses that were damaged in the Changning earthquake on June 17 might be livable after reinforcement. But they might have been further damaged in the earthquake on Thursday and became unlivable," said Chen Housheng, deputy chief of the standing committee of the Yibin people's congress.

As a scientist, Chen studied geology as a university student and was a leading official of the Yibin science and technology bureau.

The Changning earthquake killed 13 and injured 268 in Yibin, including four deaths and 128 injuries in Gongxian.

More than 2, 800 aftershocks have taken place since June 17.

Chen attributed the high frequency to the fact that the fault zone of the Hengduan Mountain running from northwest to southeast has been active in recent years.

He ruled out the possibility that earthquakes were triggered by shale gas exploitation.