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(CNN) -- It was early on Saturday when the residents of a small mountain town in the southern Chinese Province of Sichuan were shaken from their morning reverie by a powerful earthquake.
Fearing for their lives, many ran into the streets in terror as buildings around them shook violently and began to collapse.
The town of Longmen found itself at the epicenter of the quake, which struck just after 8 a.m. local time catching most people unawares as they prepared for work and the day ahead.
READ: Rescuers race to find survivors
Some escaped from their homes so quickly that their animals were left tethered helplessly outside.
Military medical officers carry a patient to an ambulance at the hospital in Ya'an, China, on Monday, April 22, three days after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake hit China's southwest Sichuan Province. The death toll is rising as rescue works scramble to find survivors and bodies.
Photos: Earthquake strikes China
Quake strikes China's Sichuan province
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"I was cooking breakfast," said Xiao Qiong. She described how her son was playing nearby when it struck.
"All of a sudden the house started swaying back and forth," she said. All she could do was grab her son and run.
Terrifying experience
For Xiao, the tremor was particularly terrifying given her experience five years earlier when the same region was decimated by another earthquake that killed more than 87,000 people. She was pregnant with her son at the time, so when Saturday's quake hit she recalled how scared she was for her unborn child and feared for the worst this time around.
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"I shouted his name and screamed 'Where are you? Where are you?'
"I found him lying on a couch ... grabbed him and tripped on my way out. Everything was shaking -- houses, the electricity pole. It lasted a long time."
Both Xiao and her son survived.
But her uncle, who lived next door, was not so lucky after being crushed to death when his house collapsed on top of him.
Wrecked landscape
Though this weekend's earthquake was not as devastating as in 2008, a walk around Longmen and other similarly remote towns and villages in Lushan County attests to considerable suffering, with thousands of people left hungry and homeless amid a wrecked landscape.
"We need everything. We haven't had a proper meal or drank good water since the quake," said Luo Hongying, as a group of fellow residents, both old and young, huddled together in a makeshift shelter.
The 49 year old described how she was leaving the house when it started to shake.
"I was just so frightened, I couldn't think straight," she said. "I just wanted to save my family inside."
Many were forced to spend the night in basic tents without electricity as they wait for more help from the outside world.
Aftershocks
Relief efforts have been hampered in their efforts by numerous aftershocks, some of which were stronger than magnitude 5.0, and massive boulders that had tumbled into valleys, blocking the roads into severely affected areas.
The threat of fresh landslides has made the situation all the more perilous for rescue teams searching for victims in the ruins of heavily damaged houses.
A soldier, one of thousands drafted in to help with the rescue operation, was badly injured by falling debris as he worked to find bodies trapped inside wrecked buildings. Fortunately an ambulance managed to get into this town, but it will be very difficult to get him out because of the badly damaged roads.
CNN's Steven Jiang in Lushan contributed to this report.
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Chinese soldiers search for survivors on Sunday, April 21, in Lushan County.
A building in Ya'an is lopsided on Sunday.
Families rest at an emergency relief center in Ya'an on Sunday.
Rescuers evacuate an injured survivor onto a military helicopter on Sunday.
People cover their faces as rocks fall from mountains on their way home to Ya'an on Sunday.
A woman carries her baby through rubble in Lushan County in Sichuan, China, on Sunday, April 21.
Survivors and rescuers make their way along a damaged area in Lushan on Sunday.
A family rests in a makeshift shelter in Lushan on Sunday.
Chinese residents sleep in open areas for fear of aftershocks in Sichuan Province on Sunday.
Chinese residents sleep in a car on Sunday to avoid danger from aftershocks.
Rescue workers distribute food on Sunday.
Rescuers dig through rubble in quake-hit Qingren township in southwest China's Sichuan Province on Saturday, April 20.
Residents rest near destroyed houses in Sichuan Province on Saturday.
A rescue car from Chengdu Military Region falls off a cliff into a river in Sichuan Province. Two of the 17 soldiers in the car had died by 11:30 p.m. Saturday Beijing time.
Rescuers carry a paralyzed patient from a collapsed house on Sunday in Qingren township.
A woman walks on bricks fallen from a collapsed house Saturday in Longmen township.
Displaced children rest at an evacuation shelter in Baosheng township on Saturday.
Houses collapsed on the side of a road in Sichuan province.
Rescuers run through a road blocked by fallen rocks on Saturday.
This photo taken on a helicopter shows the quake-destroyed houses in Taiping Town in Ya'an City on Saturday.
Medical workers pull an injured patient out of the emergency treatment room Saturday at a medical emergency center in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province.
A collapsed house sits in Gucheng Village.
Rescuers head for Baosheng township on Saturday.
Rescuers sit on ruins of a house in Longmen, an area close to the epicenter of the earthquake.
People attempt to move a huge rock blocking the road to Longmen township on Saturday.
Residents help carry injured people to the hospital on Saturday in the city of Ya'an.
Rubble covers roadside houses in Longmen on Saturday.
Traffic passes debris in Chongqing on Saturday.
A girl gives offerings to the dead by the side of ruins in Longmen on Saturday.
A rescuer stands by a damaged building in Longmen on Saturday.
Huge rocks lie on a road in Longmen on Saturday.
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