(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-05-13 13:17

CHENGDU -- Teams that have attempted to reach Wenchuan, epicenter of a powerful earthquake that claimed lives of nearly 10,000 people in Sichuan Province and adjacent regions so far, via land, air and water were thwarted.

Rescuers try to find survivors under the rubble of a collapsed middle school in Juyuan, southwestern China's Sichuan province, Tuesday, May 13, 2008. [Xinhua]

An official with Sichuan Provincial Headquarters for Earthquake Control and Relief Efforts cited interrupted transport and telecom, alongside bad rainy weather as the key factors to hold back efforts to access the epicenter.

"The efforts to reach Wenchuan will by no means be stopped," said the official.

An earthquake measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale jolted Wenchuan County in Tibetan-Qiang Autonomous Prefecture of Aba, Sichuan Province, at 2:28 pm Monday, leveling some 500,000 rooms in the affected areas and leaving 9,219 people dead, confirmed the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

The strong quake was felt in 25 Chinese provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions, including Taiwan. But at the moment, the deaths were mainly found in the worst-affected regions such as Gansu, Shaanxi, Chongqing, Yunnan, Shanxi, Guizhou, Hubei, in addition to Sichuan.

The roads to enter Wenchuan from Dujianyan City were fully cut and it is very difficult to repair them for the time being, so armed police officers were arranged to reach Wenchuan by riding two speedboats via a local reservoir at about 4 am on Tuesday, but they were never heard from ever since.

In the meantime, the provincial headquarters originally planned to send a working group to reach Wenchuan by first taking a flight in Chengdu, the provincial capital, to an airport in Songpan, a county in Aba, and then resorting to the land connecting Wenchuan through Maoxian, also inside Aba.

"The plan could not be materialized as the plane could not take off because of poor rainy weather in Chengdu and Aba," said the official.

The land connecting Maoxian to Wenchuan was said to be destroyed in the earthquake and suspended from traffic at the moment.

Tibetan-Qiang Autonomous Prefectural Government of Aba on Tuesday reported that more than 1,000 rescuers the prefectural government dispatched from Ma'erkang, the seat of Aba, were stranded on the way to Wenchuan because of impassable roads. Some of the rescuers who insisted in walking over to Wenchuan were also lost contact.

About 60,000 people in three townships and Wolong special administrative zone in Wenchuan county, the epicenter of the strong earthquake, remained out of reach by Tuesday morning, according to He Biao, deputy secretary-general of the Aba government.