Forty-eight tourists have escaped Monday's earthquake and arrived in Dujiangyan, Sichuan Province, safely on Tuesday, while more than 2,000 tourists including 15 British were still out of reach.

The 48 tourists, coming from Guangdong and Chongqing, were organized into two tourist teams. The tourists, together with their tour guide and a driver, gave up the coach after the road in Maoxian County, Aba Prefecture of Sichuan, was blocked by a landslide. They walked from Maoxian to Dujiangyan.

A team of Chongqing officials and travel agency executives have set off for Dujiangyan with vehicles loaded with food, water and drugs.

One tourist coach was buried by a landslide in Maoxian County, leaving 37 people dead, according to the Sichuan provincial emergency management office on Tuesday morning.

The office said that more than 2,000 tourists including the British were stranded in the Aba Autonomous Prefecture of Tibetan and Qiang Nationalities.

The British tourists were likely in Wolong, where the China Wolong Giant Panda Protection and Research Center is located.

A spokesman of the Sichuan Provincial Foreign Affairs Office told Xinhua at 7:15 a.m. Tuesday that they had not received reports of deaths of foreigners in the province, including reports from tourist attractions of Jiuzhaigou and Huanglong.

However, China Wolong Giant Panda Protection and Research Center, which is in the worst-hit area and home to some 130 pandas, was out of contact as all telecommunications services were cut. The casualties and damages there were unknown yet, the spokesman added.

The death toll from Monday's strong earthquake has climbed to 9,219, according to the latest figure given by the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

(Xinhua News Agency May 13, 2008)