Earthquake survivors in Zhangye City of northwest China's Gansu Province are battling sudden snow and the chilly temperature of 6 degrees Celsius below zero Thursday as they try to rebuild their lives.

More than 2,500 soldiers have again been sent out to help people in quake-hit areas.

Some 22,000 families in the city's quake areas have been relocated to cotton tents and sheds with heated brick beds or to relatives, while more than 10,000 families were still sheltering in makeshift tents on Thursday, said a spokesman of the city government.

The spokesman said most of the buried grain, quilts and clothes had been dug out from the collapsed buildings while cotton-padded tents and other relief materials continued to reach the area.

He said some 90 percent of the 60,000-plus students in the quake areas had also resumed class by Thursday.

The earthquakes, measuring 6.1 and 5.8 on the Richter scale, rattled areas between Minle and Shandan counties of Zhangye City on Oct. 25, killing nine people and injuring 43 others while leaving more than 33,547 families homeless.

Local officials said relief materials like cotton-padded tents are sorely needed, especially in the hardest-hit villages where all houses were damaged by the quakes, as the temperature will drop to 20 degrees below zero when winter comes.

According to statistics from the Zhangye City government, the twin quakes affected 46,491 households, flattened 14,322 houses and caused damage to 45,950 houses in the two counties.

To date, there has been no report of disease spread in the areas.

Gansu is a quake-prone province where two fault lines pass through. The juncture area between Minle and Shandan counties, which was hit by the twin tremors, is located in the central part of the Qilian Mountain seismic belt.

(Xinhua News Agency November 7, 2003)