Chinese state media reported that the number of people dead is approaching 15,000.
Those reports amaze me to how accurate they are, and just how much theyve been guessing in the media.SplinterStrike wrote:
Chinese state media reported that the number of people dead is approaching 15,000.
Its been 10k, 30k, even 100k the other day. I think if they cant possibly know, then they should stfu until they get an accurate(ish) number, not be out by a matter of 85000 deaths (to that figure anyway)
It really sickens me.
I think I'm going to murder whoever keeps updating msnbc.com's front page with story after story of Chinese survivors and the girl losing her legs to get out of the rubble. OMFG! 2 days of this shit! When is it going to stop?
Freaky Deaky..
Xbone Stormsurgezz
I saw that earlier.
Doesn't do it justice. No video could. Earthquakes are terrifying, violent things.
Doesn't do it justice. No video could. Earthquakes are terrifying, violent things.
Have to say, well done to the Chinese. All reports state their response has been lightning fast and highly organized.
Without a doubt their neighbour's incompetence and the Olympics played a part but no-one's complaining.
Without a doubt their neighbour's incompetence and the Olympics played a part but no-one's complaining.
The paradox is only a conflict between reality and your feeling what reality ought to be.
~ Richard Feynman
~ Richard Feynman
Perhaps if they had been more responsive prior to the disaster we wouldn't be looking at 10,000 dead Chinese (infrastructure much)? Anyone following the actions of Myanmar junta will look like heroes tbh.Spark wrote:
Have to say, well done to the Chinese. All reports state their response has been lightning fast and highly organized.
Without a doubt their neighbour's incompetence and the Olympics played a part but no-one's complaining.
Xbone Stormsurgezz
So.......you're holding China responsible for not be further industrialised?Kmarion wrote:
Perhaps if they had been more responsive prior to the disaster we wouldn't be looking at 10,000 dead Chinese (infrastructure much)? Anyone following the actions of Myanmar junta will look like heroes tbh.
No , just the deplorable neglect of their citizens.ZombieVampire! wrote:
So.......you're holding China responsible for not be further industrialised?Kmarion wrote:
Perhaps if they had been more responsive prior to the disaster we wouldn't be looking at 10,000 dead Chinese (infrastructure much)? Anyone following the actions of Myanmar junta will look like heroes tbh.
Xbone Stormsurgezz
But in what way? You complained the infrastructure wasn't there to start with, what infrastructure?Kmarion wrote:
No , just the deplorable neglect of their citizens.ZombieVampire! wrote:
So.......you're holding China responsible for not be further industrialised?Kmarion wrote:
Perhaps if they had been more responsive prior to the disaster we wouldn't be looking at 10,000 dead Chinese (infrastructure much)? Anyone following the actions of Myanmar junta will look like heroes tbh.
Last edited by ZombieVampire! (2008-05-15 00:29:32)
Priorities. http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5j_Nr … gD90LKMDO0"This building is just a piece of junk," one newly homeless resident of Dujiangyan yelled Wednesday, her body quivering with rage. Her family salvaged clothing and mementos from their wrecked apartment, built when their older home was razed 10 years ago.
"The government tricked us. It told us this building was well constructed. But look at the homes all around us, they're still standing," said the woman, who would give only her surname, Chen.
Three decades of high-paced growth have remade China, with stunning showcase metropolises like Beijing and Shanghai as well as formerly tiny county towns that are now small cities with office towers and multistory apartment buildings. But as the widespread devastation from Monday's quake shows, the pell-mell pace has led some builders to cut corners, especially in outlying areas largely populated by the very young and the very old.
"This new economy in China is not going up safely, it's going up fast, and the two don't go together," said Roger Bilham, a professor of geological sciences at the University of Colorado at Boulder. "You look at the buildings that fell and they should not have fallen," he said. "This is a story that has been repeated throughout the developing nations."
New buildings in Beijing — like the signature "Bird's Nest" National Stadium for this August's Olympics — are built to exacting codes to withstand earthquakes. But "anti-earthquake standards are not as strict in places like Sichuan as in Shanghai," said Ren Bing, an architectural designer at Hong Kong-based China Construction International Co.
Monday's temblor flattened smaller towns in the disaster zone like Yingxiu, where 7,700 people were reported to have died according to aerial footage shown on state-run China Central Television. A hilltop view of Beichuan, another hard-hit town, showed entire blocks of apartment buildings that seemingly disintegrated.
In Dujiangyan city, where rescuers saved a woman eight months pregnant who was trapped for 50 hours under a collapsed apartment building, there was little evidence of steel reinforcement bars in the concrete rubble.
Other infrastructure old and new suffered as well. Nearly 400 dams, most of them small, were damaged across Sichuan, the government's economic planning agency said on its Web site. One of the two bigger ones, Zipingpu, had cracks four inches across its top; and though the government said the dam was safe, its reservoir was drained.
Xbone Stormsurgezz
Sounds like Britain during the industrial revolution to me.
7.9 is pretty high up there.
I just pray another one like that won't happen again, especially when the Three Gorges Dam is being finished. If an earthquake hits that, China is in deeper trouble.
I just pray another one like that won't happen again, especially when the Three Gorges Dam is being finished. If an earthquake hits that, China is in deeper trouble.
Last edited by link52787 (2008-05-15 00:54:33)
ZombieVampire! wrote:
Sounds like Britain and the United States during the industrial revolution to me.
Right, cept China had a four thousand year head start.nukchebi0 wrote:
ZombieVampire! wrote:
Sounds like Britain and the United States during the industrial revolution to me.
Xbone Stormsurgezz
Well, duh.
They also had the joy of being carved up and dominated by European powers during the first 20 years of the 20th century as well as the perpetual conflict from 1931-1950. China's economic development now is much like that of the US or Britain during the industrial revolution, and as it seems, the building codes (or lack thereof) are as well.
And I don't get the purpose of the link.
They also had the joy of being carved up and dominated by European powers during the first 20 years of the 20th century as well as the perpetual conflict from 1931-1950. China's economic development now is much like that of the US or Britain during the industrial revolution, and as it seems, the building codes (or lack thereof) are as well.
And I don't get the purpose of the link.
Its hard for a country to go through such a radical change without someone cutting corners somewhere.Kmarion wrote:
Right, cept China had a four thousand year head start.nukchebi0 wrote:
ZombieVampire! wrote:
Sounds like Britain and the United States during the industrial revolution to me.
The Chinese are also notorious for cutting corners to get ahead.
The central government also very easily turns a blind eye to the outlying areas unless there is a reason not to. The one child policy crackdown in the Guangxi Autonamous Region for one example. They were running short on cash, so they decided to make people pay up that they had let slide previously
"The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation" - Barack Obama (a freshman senator from Illinios)
Right, the poor victimized Chinese .. the guys who spent decades drowning their daughter in rice paddies. Long before Europe was a pimple on the ass of civilization. Happy joy indeed. Duh?nukchebi0 wrote:
Well, duh.
They also had the joy of being carved up and dominated by European powers during the first 20 years of the 20th century as well as the perpetual conflict from 1931-1950. China's economic development now is much like that of the US or Britain during the industrial revolution, and as it seems, the building codes (or lack thereof) are as well.
And I don't get the purpose of the link.
Xbone Stormsurgezz
Perhaps its the all mighty thinning out Earth's population...too_money2007 wrote:
What's with all these larger earthquakes this year? Pretty crazy.
or the tectonic plates are shifiting.
Can we agree that China is in very precarious position. They have a huge population they are trying to move into the 21st century. They are dealing with a culture of cutting corners while trying to earn respect and contracts throughout the world. They are starting to recover from a massive earth quake which struck a region which was particularly vulnerable to such a quake for various reasons ( building inadequacies and geography being the big ones).
It will be interesting to see how things change over the next 5 to 10 years over there. I hope they follow through on the things they are touting over there.
It will be interesting to see how things change over the next 5 to 10 years over there. I hope they follow through on the things they are touting over there.
"The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation" - Barack Obama (a freshman senator from Illinios)