Hampshire News
Click the logos above for more stories from your area.
Rallying to aid of quake victims
 |
| ALIVE: A man is trapped in the debris in Beichuan County. |
SOUTHAMPTON'S Chinese community has launched a fundraising drive to help victims of the devastating earthquake that has killed at least 12,000 in central China.
Chinese students at the University of Southampton will be collecting donations at the student office on Thursday and Friday and a drop-in session will be held at the African-Caribbean Centre, on Trinity Road, Newtown, today.
Ping Hua, chair of the Chinese Association of Southampton, said money raised would go the International Red Cross appeal.
"We need a lot of help because the losses are devastating, at the moment we are only scratching the surface but I believe there will be more and more people found dead," she said.
Ms Hua said she had spoken to friends left homeless after China's most powerful earthquake in 30 years.
"They are all fine, apart from being a bit in shock, especially the young children who have never experienced anything like this before. They said it was really scary, the tremors lasted about three or four minutes which is a very long time in my experience," she said.
"It was in the middle of the day and it made their furniture and bookshelves fall down, everybody ran out into the street and were told not to go back to their homes as it was too dangerous. When I spoke to them last night they were still experiencing after-shocks, I could hear the wall's creaking and her daughter screaming in the background."
Chinese officials have said at least 12,000 people were killed in the earthquake. These included five children who died when their primary school was destroyed in Chongqing City.
Travel companies and British officials were last tonight continuing to try to contact UK tourists still unaccounted for after the devastating earthquake.
There has been no news on the whereabouts of at least 19 British holidaymakers who were travelling in the worst-hit region of the country.
The 19 were clients of Travel Collection, which is part of holiday company Kuoni, and were in Wenchuan county on a coach trip when the 7.9-magnitude earthquake struck on Monday.
Meanwhile, UK travel organisation Abta was able to say that at least 100 UK tourists travelling in the earthquake region of Sichuan province were safe and unhurt.
How to make a donation:
- Go to the student union office at the University of Southampton all day Thursday and Friday.
- Visit the African-Caribbean Centre, on Trinity Road, Newton, from 12.30pm to 2.30pm today an every Wednesday.
- Send cheques payable to the Chinese Aossication of Southampton to 135 St Mary Street, Southampton, SO14 1NX. (Write Earthquake Relief Fund on back of cheque).
- Email info@southamptonchinese.org.uk for more information.
9:00am Wednesday 14th May 2008
Print 
Email this 
Comment
What are these links for?
If you liked this article and would like to share it with others on the web who might be searching for good content we've made it easy for you to do it.
At the bottom of all articles, you'll see links to six sites. These sites - commonly called 'social bookmark' or 'social news' sites - have large communities of web users who share and rate interesting, useful and fun things on the web.
Clicking the links will automatically add the address of the story you are reading to one of these sites, letting you share it with others. Each site will ask you to register to share stories. Registration is free and once a member, you can store, recommend and search for stories that interest you.
More on Digg
More on del.icio.us
More on Furl
More on reddit
More on NowPublic/
More on Yahoo!
