BEIJING -- (UPDATE 2) An earthquake in southwest China on Monday left nearly 900 students buried, the official Xinhua news agency reported.
Chinese President Hu Jintao called for "all-out" efforts to rescue victims of the powerful earthquake Xinhua reported, adding Premier Wen Jiabao had traveled to the epicenter of the 7.8-magnitude quake in Sichuan province.
The Chinese government had also sent troops to help with disaster relief work.
The powerful quake struck close to densely populated areas of southwest China and shook buildings as far away as Bangkok, officials said, sending thousands of people onto the streets.
Tremors were also felt in Hong Kong, Hanoi and Taipei, residents said, but there were no immediate reports of damage,
The quake struck 93 kilometers (58 miles) from Chengdu, capital of Sichuan province and a major population centre with more than 12 million people, and about 260 kilometers from Chongqing and its 30 million.
Xinhua reported the quake 7.8 on the Richter scale. The US Geological Survey measured it at 7.5.
Buildings shook in Beijing and Shanghai at the same time, residents in the cities reported, with many people evacuating tower blocks, although there were no immediate reports of major damage in those major cities.
A reporter for CCTV news in Chengdu said residents had poured out onto the streets but public transport and electricity supplies remained operational.
However, the tremor appeared to have disrupted cellular telecommunications in the city, he added.
Asked if anyone had been hurt, the reporter said: "All appears to be fine."
State television also said there appeared to be no infrastructure problems in Chongqing.
The phone network in Chengdu and elsewhere around the country appeared to suffer a meltdown as people throughout China tried to find out what happened, making it extremely difficult to contact residents.
The quake struck shortly before 2.30 pm (0630 GMT), according to the USGS, at a depth of just 10 kilometers (six miles).
Two residents near downtown Chengdu that Agence France-Presse contacted by phone said they felt a violent shaking that threw glassware to the floor and toppled street lights.
However, they were not sure whether the quake had caused significant damage in the city as they had not yet ventured far from their own home.
Further information could not be obtained as the connection was cut.
The quake was felt in the Taiwanese capital Taipei, where buildings swayed for around half a minute.
It was also felt in the southern Chinese territory of Hong Kong, the Hong Kong Observatory said.
"Several local residents called the Hong Kong Observatory to report having felt a tremor," it said in a statement, adding its seismograph also picked up the tremor.
"A number of local residents reported to have felt this tremor which lasted several seconds," the Observatory said in a statement.
In Hanoi, residents said some high buildings shook for around five minutes but there were no reports of damage.
The last powerful quake to hit China was on March 21, a 7.2 magnitude quake which struck near the northwestern city of Hotan in Xinjiang province.
Xinhua reported that a quake measuring 3.9 on the Richter scale hit Beijing at the same time as near Chengdu.
A reporter for Hong Kong-based Cable News based in Kunming, the capital of southwestern Yunnan province which borders Sichuan, said he saw many people running onto the streets to find out what had happened.
"One office worker working on the 11th floor of a building in Kunming told me that the lamps in his office were shaking and he felt dizzy," the reporter told the local broadcaster.
He added that people in Kunming had tried to call their friends in Sichuan, but the lines were jammed.
The USGS estimate of the depth makes it a so-called "shallow" earthquake -- a category generally known to cause greater damage than deeper ones.
One of the biggest quakes ever recorded was in China in 1976, which killed 242,000 people.
That quake centered in the northern city of Tangshan lasted for 15 seconds and flattened 90 percent of buildings. The death toll, out of a population of one million, made it one of the deadliest in the world in the 20th century.
In 1920 and again in 1927, separate quakes each left some 200,000 dead. (Agence France-Presse)
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