Workers in Beijing, Shanghai flee buildings in panic after quake
Posted: 12 May 2008 1957 hrs

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BEIJING - Office workers in China's two biggest cities Beijing and Shanghai told Monday of their panic as they fled shaking skyscrapers after an earthquake struck in a distant part of the country.

"My boss told everyone to run, so everyone rushed downstairs and stood outside," said Cat McDowall, a media producer working in the Nanxincang International Building in Beijing.

"No one really knew what had happened, and we eventually went back in."

The earthquake, measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale hit a mountainous region of southwest China's Sichuan province during the middle of the afternoon.

A tremor of magnitude 3.9 struck Beijing -- about 1,500 kilometres (930 miles) away from the quake's epicentre -- about the same time, China's official Xinhua news agency said, adding there were dozens of aftershocks across the country.

People reported feeling tremors as far away as Bangkok, Thailand.

At least 107 people have been confirmed dead in Sichuan and neighbouring provinces, Xinhua said, although there were no reports of major damage in Beijing or Shanghai, where tremors were also felt.

"It went on for a good couple of minutes, or it felt like it," said Andy Sleigh, a consultant working in Capital Tower in downtown Beijing.

"Some of my colleagues started panicking and left the office, and someone then told me to get out. There was mass disorganisation outside, with more than 500 people and we stayed there for about an hour."

Cissy Bullock, who works in the Oriental Kenzo building complex in Beijing, said she suddenly felt very dizzy.

"It felt a bit like being sea sick, when you come off a boat and you've got sea legs," she said.

"We all got out and had to walk down the fire escape from the 21st floor, and stood outside for about 20 minutes not really knowing what had happened."

People reported difficulties in making mobile phone calls in Beijing, as the network seemed to struggle with the amount of calls being made.

In Shanghai, on China's far east coast 1,700 kilometres away from the quake's epicentre, many office towers were also evacuated after the tremors hit.

"People in our building all panicked. We went out for shelter. I felt a strong earthquake, similar to the one in Kobe in Japan," said Shen Jie, a banker working in a Japanese bank on the 20th floor of a 230-metre-high (750-feet) building in Shanghai.

Shen was studying in Kobe University when an earthquake struck in 1995, killing more than 6,000 people.

Pictures taken in Shanghai's Lujiazui Financial Zone showed hundreds of people filling the alleys of a park outside office buildings.

Lilian Wu, a marketing official with a fund management firm on the 37th floor of Jinmao Tower in downtown Shanghai, said she felt dizzy when the quake struck.

"There was no evacuation in our company, and it seemed no one in the building was evacuated," she said.

"But office workers in nearby HSBC and Huaneng Tower were evacuated," she said. - AFP/ir