Jiegu Town, China - The 700-year-old Changu Temple in Jiegu Town, Yushu County was devastated in the Yushu earthquake, leaving many monks injured and some killed. Cultural relics such as sutras and Tangkas were buried under the ruins.
The Changu Temple is the biggest temple of the White Sect (one of the four branches of Tibetan Buddhism) in Yushu and it's about four kilometers away from Jiegu Town.
There were 260 monks in the temple before the quake. However, 31 of them were killed and 27 were seriously injured in the quake.
According to the monks, the quake was so sudden that many sutras, Buddha statues, Tangkas as well as many rare cultural relics could not be rescued. Though many relics were lost, after the aftershocks the rescue work organized by government began immediately.