A local student reads a book while wrapped in a quilt in his dormitory in Urumqi, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region on Monday, December 4, 2006. [Xinhua]

Tens of thousands of cold and shivering residents in Urumqi, capital of northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, are unlikely to have heat for several more days.

A major boiler that provides central heating to 10,000 households, institutions and businesses broke down late last Saturday.

Night time temperatures are below minus 10 Celsius with daytime highs barely reach minus seven.

Zhang Yun, an engineer with the heating company, said on Tuesday he didn't know when the boiler would be repaired but most of the staff have been asked to take help fix it.

Xinjiang Huadian Weihuliang Power Generation Co. operates two 20-meter tall boiler that can generate 450 tons of steam an hour, he said.

A build-up of dregs on the walls of one of the coal-fired boilers is being blamed for suspension of heating to the Shuimogou and Tianshan districts of the city.

Burning low-quality, dirty coal caused the build-up on the walls of the boiler's furnace.

Hospitals, schools and a university in the two districts are also without heat.

The city provides central heating to residents from Oct. 14 to March 14.

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