Beichuan Qiang Autonomous County

China / Sichuan / Mianyang /
 autonomous counties of China  Add category
Beichuan town, Mianyang prefecture, Sichuan province, China.
Sustained very heavy damage from landslides in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake.

adventure.howstuffworks.com/abandoned-city.htm
Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beichuan_Qiang_Autonomous_County
Nearby cities:
Coordinates:   31°36'15"N   104°27'50"E

Comments

  • This appears to be the location of the Tangjiashan dam/reservoir/landslide, currently threatening 1.3+ milllion people downstream... Can anyone confirm this? Too bad the image is so blurry. From the photos, i.e., http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/c/a/2008/05/28/MNUQ10U64M.DTL&o=0 -- the dam appears immediately upstream from the city, and the landslide is clearly visible just above that, across the middle of the reservoir. Currently the dam's failure level is 23 meters above the water, with the water rising 2-3 meters per day -- but if the landslide gives way that will wash away the dam. The army is trying to cut a controlled spillway through the landslide, to relieve the pressure.
  • Above location confirmed as follows: landslide is just above the rectangle -- http://unosat.web.cern.ch/unosat/freeproducts/china/Earthquake2008/Beichuan_Infrastructure-SAR_2008-05-18_high.jpeg
  • See also: [excerpt] "Another landslide which blocked a river above the town of Beichuan, causing a dangerous barrier lake to form, is still being tackled by a detachment of 2,000 soldiers with dynamite and earth-moving equipment also landed by helicopter. "The 158,000 remaining residents of the valley below have been moved to higher ground, while there are contingency plans to move 1 million more if the natural dam looks likely to burst completely. "That would include all the population of the major city of Mianyang, home to 800,000 people and some of China's most advanced engineering facilities..." http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/2048318/China-earthquake-Villagers-rescued-after-16-days.html
  • It is the location of the (former) county town, Qushan. You may compare to the Chinese satellite map edited by the Chinese State Bureau of Surveying and Mapping, an image that is much better than the Wikimapia one: see http://www.sbsm.gov.cn/article//ztzl/zqdt/scs/200805/20080500035339.shtml
This article was last modified 4 years ago