City fixes schools on fault lines

City fixes schools on fault lines

• Source: Global Times
• [10:33 March 17 2011]
• Comments

Students at Huajiadi Primary School in Chaoyang district resume classes in temporary buildings on Tuesday. Their school buildings are still undergoing reinforcement work. Photo: CFP

By Huang Shaojie

An unspecified number of Beijing schools are sitting on earthquake fault lines - but which ones and where they are, officials refuse to say.

Source: Chinese National Geography

A Beijing Municipal Commission of Education press release yesterday did not name a single primary or middle school and did not reveal how many or where they might be located, merely stating such schools will be "given priority" in the school building reinforcement program.

An information session on the program hosted by the education commission on Wednesday allegedly identified three schools that "may have to be moved to safer localities," according to yesterday's Legal Mirror report. The report did not name any school.

An education commission communications officer who refused to be named, refused to confirm or deny the figure.

How schools were assessed or reinforced, she also refused to say. "Use the press release," she said.

"I can't give you anything beyond that."

The official press statement reads: "The safety program is proceeding smoothly. All 512 schools inspected for their buildings' earthquake-resistance qualities will open for the new school year on time."

Students at 95 schools will not be going back to their old school buildings on September 1, the statement conceded, as reinforcement work will not be completed by then.

Temporary venues have been allocated for these schools for an indefinite period of time, according to the education commission.

City authorities refused to delineate the seismic fault lines that run through Beijing.

"You might spread panic," said a Beijing Earthquake Bureau spokesman who refused to be named.

Text messages on April 15 spread rumors of fake quakes in Hebei Province and Inner Mongolia one day after a magnitude 7.1 earthquake had hit Yushu, Qinghai Province, killing 199 schoolchildren.

Geological disasters have increased tenfold in the first six months of this year compared to last year, Minister of Land and Resources Xu Shaoshi was quoted as saying by the Xinhua News Agency on August 20.

"Beijing is right in the middle of a North China seismic belt," a self-titled seismology enthusiast Beijing Laoji wrote in his Sohu blog post. He identified six fault lines as running across the city.

China launched an 8 billion yuan ($1.18 billion) school safety program on April 1 last year aimed at increasing the earthquake resistance of buildings in vulnerable areas over the next three years.