Survivors dig through rubble after deadly China earthquake

The death toll in southern China's earthquake rose to 589 on Wednesday as search and rescue teams pushed into isolated mountain communities to clear debris from collapsed homes.

The Yunnan provincial government said more than 2,400 people were injured in Sunday's 6.1-magnitude quake in the mountainous Yunnan farming region of Ludian county — the country's deadliest tremor in years.

At a makeshift headquarters in the forecourt of a cracked middle school in the worst-hit town of Longtoushan, a senior colonel in the People's Liberation Army said there might still be hope to find survivors.

"There are a lot of people that we may never be able to dig out," said senior Col. Feng, who declined to give his full name because he was not an officially designated spokesman. "But there is still hope."

Wednesday's big jump in the death toll — up from 410 on Tuesday — was due to rescuers arriving in places where they had previously been unable to contact anybody, in small farming villages built into the mountains above the main towns, said Feng, a military officer based in Sichuan province.

The earthquake destroyed thousands of buildings, according to state media.

"A huge quake lake containing more than 106,000 cubic feet of water has inundated dozens of homes and continues to threaten nearby villages," the Xinhua news agency quoted hydrological officials as saying.

"Its water level is increasing at a speed of 1,060 cubic feet per hour, putting seven power stations in the lower reaches in danger," Xinhua reported.

Thousands of police, soldiers and firefighters have been sent to help, but rescue work is being hampered by poor infrastructure, aftershocks and debris in the mountainous region.

On Monday, an army doctor went missing while trying to swim across another lake to help a villager search for his missing wife, according to Xinhua.

Workers have begun letting water out of two reservoirs that were cracked by the quake, it said.

Amid the flood threat, recovery efforts continue as locals dig through the rubble of flattened homes and buildings.

Some 10,000 troops used pickaxes and backhoes to clear roads and dig residents from collapsed homes, while volunteers like student Jackson Zeng used their bare hands.

Zeng joined a group of two dozen classmates who headed to Yunnan province's Ludian county, where Sunday's earthquake collapsed thousands of homes in an impoverished region of mountainous farmland.

"I grew up around here, and these are my people. I'm not sure what I can do, but I will help any way that I can," said Zeng, a third-year student at Kunming University of Science and Technology.

Official media have also reported acts of heroism including a soldier distributing food fainting from hunger and university students forsaking their studies to join the rescue effort.

Premier Li Keqiang went to the disaster zone on Monday and media broadcasts and websites have been carrying pictures and footage of him trudging through devastated areas and offering condolences to survivors.

The seriously injured would be taken for treatment outside the quake zone, while the government would take quarantine measures to prevent epidemics, Li said, according to Xinhua.

Yunnan's provincial government pledged $3.73 million for disaster relief, while the Red Cross Society of China donated $5.41 million, Xinhua reported.

Earthquakes frequently strike the region. A quake in Sichuan province, also in the southwest, in 2008 killed almost 70,000 people.

Wire services