BEIJING (AP) ? A series of earthquakes collapsed houses and triggered landslides in a remote mountainous part of southwestern China on Friday, killing at least 50 people with the toll expected to rise. The quakes started with a 5.6-magnitude shock before 11:30 a.m. along the borders of Guizhou and Yunnan provinces, and another equally big quake struck shortly after noon followed by more than 60 aftershocks, Chinese and U.S. government seismologists said. Hardest hit was Yiliang County, where 49 of the 50 deaths occurred, said Yunnan province government agencies and state media. Footage showed a couple hundred people crowding into what looked like a school athletic field in Yiliang's county seat, a sizeable city spread along a river in a valley bottom. By comparison, the 7.6-magnitude quake that struck Costa Rica this week was 41 kilometers (25 miles) below the surface, and combined with strict building codes, that kept damage and deaths to a minimum.
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