More than 70 teachers and students from Hong Kong and the Chinese mainland who were reported missing in northwest China's Qinghai Province were found safe and sound in a neighboring province nearly four hours after their contact were lost, a local government official said on Thursday night.

Xu Ruxin, vice head of Menyuan Hui Autonomous County, told Xinhua that the teachers and students had been found in Wuwei City in the neighboring Gansu Province. He said no casualties were reported.

Contact with the teachers and students, who were from the University of Hong Kong, Wuhan University and Lanzhou University, was reported lost at 8:00 PM when they were on a field research trip in the mountainous region of Ningchanzhang in Menyuan, Haibei Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Qinghai.

Dozens of local public security officials joined the search.

(Xinhua News Agency July 17, 2009)