A student sits in the shambles of his school classroom in Guancheng village in Chongqing after a magnitude 7.8 earthquake rattled Sichuan Province, China, on May 12, 2008.

The temblor, which struck around 2:30 p.m., killed almost 9,000 people and trapped nearly 900 students under the rubble of their school in Juyuan, about 62 miles (100 kilometers) from the epicenter, according to state media reports. Students were also buried under five other destroyed schools in the city of Deyang.

Fifty of the Juyuan students were confirmed dead, according to the state-run news agency Xinhua, which also quoted two girls saying they had escaped because they had “run faster than others.”

A chemical plant that collapsed in Shifang also buried hundreds of people and spilled more than 80 tons of toxic liquid ammonia from the site, Xinhua reported.

The last major earthquake hit China in 2003, when a magnitude 6.8 quake killed 268 people west of Xinjiang.

A collapsed school is seen in Chongqing, China, on May 12, 2008.

The magnitude 7.8 quake buried hundreds of students in at least eight schools across central Sichuan Province, killing at least 50 in Juyuan, according to the state-run news agency Xinhua.

Xinhua reported seeing teenagers struggling to break loose from under the rubble of their school “while others were crying out for help.”

A rescuer searches for earthquake victims in Chongqing, China, on May 12, 2008.

Nearly 9,000 people have died in the worst earthquake to hit China in three decades.

Eight percent of buildings in Beichan county were decimated, the country’s Xinhua news service reported, and many fear the death toll will continue to rise.

The earthquake occurred in an area with multiple fault lines that have produced disastrous temblors before, the Associated Press reported.