According to CCTV News, at 23:59 on December 18, 2023, a 6.2-magnitude earthquake occurred in Jishishan County, Linxia Prefecture, Gansu Province, with a focal depth of 10 kilometers. So far, 118 people have been killed in this earthquake.
Dahezhong Middle School in Jishishan County is located in Dahejia Town, which was severely affected by the disaster. At noon on December 19, the principal of the school, Ma, told the Red Star News reporter that all the more than 2,100 students and more than 190 teachers in the school were safe, and there were no casualties among the students. The students and teachers have all gone home, leaving team members on duty.
The outer wall of Dahe’s school building fell off
“Our school usually conducts a lot of fire and earthquake prevention drills. In more critical situations, our teachers emergency evacuated and evacuated all the students safely.” Principal Ma said that the school The teachers all live on campus, and more than 1,500 students live on campus. After the school evacuated the students from upstairs, they first placed them in the open space below the school. After the count was completed, some girls were sent to the teacher's vehicle to keep warm, while the boys kept warm in the gymnasium. "The students put on their bedding in the gymnasium and settled in it."
Principal Ma said that the school building had a certain degree of damage, and the teaching building, dormitory building and laboratory building were all damaged to varying degrees. There are some cracks, mainly due to peeling off of the wall skin, and experts will come to detect them later.
According to a teacher at the school, the school had conducted fire and earthquake drills not long ago. Therefore, the students evacuated in a timely and orderly manner, and so far there have been no casualties.
The teacher recalled that when the earthquake occurred late at night on the 18th, they first heard a loud noise in the school, and then found that the entire building was shaking. "The teachers on the first floor ran out first, and then found that many of the doors could not be opened and were deformed. Later, several male teachers worked together to open all the doors." Affected by the earthquake, the school subsequently lost power, so it was impossible to proceed. The broadcast announcement can only help the students wake each other up, and the teacher runs into each dormitory to evacuate the students. "In about 5 minutes, almost all the evacuation was completed."
Dahe Family School Building after the earthquake
After the students were evacuated from the dormitory, they all gathered in the stadium inside the big playground. "Some students came out wearing clothes, some with clothes, and some came out directly wrapped in quilts." A teacher said that in order to keep the students warm, many teachers did encourage the students to sing, dance and do activities at the beginning. Body. "After the aftershocks subsided, another teacher came into the dormitory and took out quilts and other items for the students."
Regarding the online reports that some students had lit books to keep warm while taking refuge in the playground, Teacher Wu said that he had asked the relevant personnel , I learned that the books burned were all discarded and old books stored in the warehouse. "The lowest temperature at night was nearly 20 degrees below zero, and there was nothing to burn around the school at that time, so they could only keep warm temporarily. Fortunately, (they) found firewood later and burned it."
"In fact, that night Some parents came to pick up the students home." A teacher told reporters that early on the 19th, he contacted the bus company, taxi company and other units online to send the students home, "to the village where the children are. Village committee centralized resettlement site." The school arranged for non-local teachers to go home directly, leaving only the school leaders and team members on duty.
Regarding the next class and resumption of classes, teachers said that the current class conditions in the school do not allow it. "I went to the teaching building and dormitory in the morning and looked around. The overall damage was quite serious. There were big cracks. It is estimated that classes cannot be started yet." Photo provided by
Red Star News reporter Luo Mengjie and Li Yida. Interviewee.
Editor Guo Zhuang, Editor-in-Chief Li
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