China orders ‘all-out’ rescue after Tibet quake kills 16

An infographic titled "7.0-magnitude earthquake hits China’s Tibet" created in Ankara, Turkiye on October 23, 2026. Elif Acar / Anadolu (Photo by Elif Acar / ANADOLU / Anadolu via AFP)

China ordered an “all-out” rescue effort in Tibet on Friday after an earthquake killed at least 16 people, injured dozens and flattened hundreds of homes, state media reported.

Footage showed rescue workers with torches clambering in the dark through some of the more than 300 houses that Xinhua said collapsed in the 7.0-magnitude quake on Thursday evening.

Diners ran out of restaurants and items fell off wobbling supermarket shelves as the tremor struck, according to clips on state broadcaster CCTV, which said 65 people were injured.

One resident told local media that her family had just gone to bed when her home shook, knocking over objects, and that they “rushed outside without even taking the time to get dressed.”

“My legs were shaking the entire time I was heading downstairs and by the time I reached the bottom, I was so terrified that I burst into tears,” the woman said.

Local residents “are afraid to return to their homes,” she said. “They set up tents along the roadside or spent the night in their cars.”

A man told the Beijing News that the “very strong” quake left his home “creaking and rattling”.

“I was asleep when it hit. Everyone has run outside now and is too afraid to go back in. I’m currently driving to an open area to sleep in my car,” he said.

Broadcaster CCTV also showed emergency personnel with helmets carrying a person and shining flashlights on damaged buildings, some with collapsed roofs.

Tibet is largely inaccessible to foreign journalists and Chinese authorities are the only source of official information.

– ‘Significant casualties’ –

President Xi Jinping said the tremor caused “significant casualties” and took place at a “high-altitude location” in cold weather.

“(We) must go all-out to carry out search and rescue operations and do our utmost to treat the injured, so as to minimise casualties,” Xinhua quoted Xi as saying.

He called for assistance for residents and rescue equipment to be sent to the area promptly.

The epicentre was in a mountainous area about 190 kilometres (120 miles) east-northeast of Nagqu, and 390 kilometres northeast of the regional capital Lhasa, the US Geological Survey said.

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It struck at 10:33 pm (1433 GMT) on Thursday at a shallow depth of around 10 kilometres.

Lhawang Dagpo, a local official in the Maru township, the quake’s epicentre, said it put cracks in the walls of his office, according to Xinhua.

Power and telecoms services were disrupted in the county seat, the agency said.

Baqing County has mobilised more than 1,600 people to help in the relief operation, CCTV reported.

The municipal fire and rescue brigade has dispatched 25 vehicles and 110 personnel, and the Nagqu Armed Police Detachment sent 225 officers and soldiers and 18 vehicles, CCTV said.

As of 4:30 am on Thursday, relief supplies including 1,000 prefabricated houses, 3,239 tents, four generators and 1,000 flashlights had been delivered, it added.

Earthquakes in China are relatively common.

In January 2025, a quake in Tibet’s rural Tingri county killed at least 126 people.

The disaster came little over a year after at least 148 people died in a quake in remote Gansu province in northwest China in December 2023, according to state media.

That quake was China’s deadliest since 2014, when more than 600 people perished in the southwestern province of Yunnan.

A massive tremor in 2008 in Sichuan province left about 90,000 people dead or missing, including around thousands of schoolchildren.