China: Troops rush to plug dam cracks

DUJIANGYAN, China (AP) -- Hundreds of dams around the epicenter of China's earthquake have been damaged and Chinese troops scrambled Wednesday to plug cracks and open sluices to prevent flooding of already devastated communities.

The National Development Reform Commission, China's top economic planning body, said the earthquake had damaged 391 dams. It said two of the dams were large ones, 28 were medium-sized and the rest were small ones.

The official Xinhua News Agency said 2,000 troops were sent to work on the Zipingpu dam, which lies on about 6 miles up the Min river from the badly damaged city of Dujiangyan in Sichuan province.

Xinhua quoted the Ministry of Water Resources Wednesday as urging protection of the Zipingpu reservoir, saying Dujiangyan would be "swamped" if major problems emerged at the dam.

The ministry had set up an emergency command center at the dam "to discharge the reservoir's rising waters and guarantee that the damage posed no threat to Dujiangyan and the neighboring Chengdu Plain," Xinhua said. full story