Flights from Beijing to quake-affected areas in southwest China were delayed on Monday, according to the Beijing capital airport.

Meanwhile, the airport of Chengdu, capital of quake-hit Sichuan Province, remained shut down as engineers assessed the runways, said the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC).

The airport had planned to reopen at 6 PM on Monday.

Air China announced that all its flights to Chengdu had been diverted to land at other airports.

It did not receive any reports of casualties or building damage from the airports.

Flights from Beijing to Chengdu, neighboring Chongqing municipality, and Xi'an in Shaanxi Province, where the tremor was also felt, were all delayed, a Beijing airport spokesman said.

The spokesman said figures were not available yet on how many flights and passengers were affected as they were still processing numbers.

Passengers were asked to call the enquiry number 64541100 at the airport for information on their flights.

A major earthquake measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale jolted Wenchuan County in southwest China's Sichuan Province at 2:28 PM on Monday, according to the China Seismological Bureau.

(Xinhua News Agency May 13, 2008)