The Associated Press reports that bodies under sheets are lining the streets of Dujiangyan the city in the Chengdu, Sichuan Province of China where a 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit on Monday.
The death toll now tops 12,000, with thousands more trapped beneath buildings. Many are now sleeping outside in makeshift tents because they fear their buildings are too unstable.
Aftershocks are still hitting Chengdu, at magnitudes of 4 and 6. Two Chinese-American tourists are missing as well as two Israeli students, according to this Yahoo! blog.
This map of Dujiangyan city in the Chengdu, Sichuan Province gives a clearer picture of where the natural disaster took place. Dujiangyan is 950 miles from beijing, where residents felt rumbling during the earthquake. The performance of the emergency relief services in China will be under close watch as the world questions its readiness to host the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.
CNN reports that an Olympics spokesman says no Olympic facilities were affected.
The last earthquake of this magnitude was in 1976, when 240,000 died outside Beijing after a quake in Tangshan.