An earthquake in Tibet has killed nearly 100 people, Chinese state media said, with many more feared trapped.

In Beijing – A powerful earthquake killed at least 95 people in Tibet on Tuesday and left many others stranded as a series of aftershocks shook the region in western China and across the border in Nepal. An official Xinhua News Agency said another 130 people were injured, citing the regional disaster relief headquarters.

About 1,500 firefighters and rescuers have been assigned to search for people in the rubble, said the Department of Emergency Management.

The US Geological Survey said the earthquake was measured at 7.1 magnitude and was as shallow as six miles. China recorded the maximum as 6.8.

The landmark was about 50 kilometers northeast of Mount Everest, across the border. This area is seismically active and is where the Indian and Eurasian plates collide and create the Himalayan mountain range that is strong enough to change the height of some of the world’s tallest peaks.

The average elevation in the area around the event is about 4,200 meters (13,800 feet), the China Earthquake Networks Center said on social media.

State broadcaster CCTV said there were a number of communities three kilometers away from the massacre, which was 240 kilometers from Lhasa, the capital of Tibet, and 14 miles from the region’s second-largest city Shigatse, known as Xigaze in Chinese.

At a distance of about 140 kilometers from the capital of Nepal, Kathmandu, the earthquake woke up the residents and caused them to run out of their houses and into the streets. No information was immediately available from remote, mountainous areas of Nepal close to the base.

There have been 10 earthquakes of at least magnitude 6 in the past 100 years in the area where Tuesday’s earthquake struck, the USGS said.

Tibet is an autonomous region of China that is largely governed by its own democratically elected government, but under the control of Beijing, which claims sovereignty over the territory it insists has belonged to China for centuries. Chinese troops moved in to quell the rebellion in 1959, Dalai Lamathe anointed spiritual leader of this region, in exile in India.

The Dalai Lama, now 89, has lived in southern India for decades, but is still considered the spiritual leader of the Tibetan people around the world. China considers him a pro-Tibetan freedom fighter, even calling him a “wolf in a monk’s robe.”

In a statement posted Tuesday on his website, the Dalai Lama said he was “deeply saddened to hear about the earthquake that occurred in Dingri, Tibet and the surrounding regions.”

He noted the “sad loss of many lives, numerous injuries, and the destruction of homes and property,” and prayed for those affected by the disaster and his hopes for a speedy recovery.