Lanzhou, December 12 (China News Service) The Bingling Temple Grottoes, a world cultural heritage site that was temporarily closed due to the 26.6 magnitude earthquake in Jishi Mountain, Gansu Province, will be reopened from December 2.
The reporter learned from the Institute of Cultural Relics Protection of Bingling Temple in Gansu Province that after the on-site investigation of the working group, the statues, murals, cave niches and other cultural relics in the Bingling Temple Grottoes were not damaged. Rockfalls appeared at the mountain gate of the grotto and in the river channel of the cave area, and cracks appeared in the wall on the side of the management and protection room near the mountain gate.
In June 2021, the Bingling Temple Grottoes, a world cultural heritage. Photo by Feng Zhijun
After the earthquake, the safety of the cultural relics of the Bingling Temple grottoes in Yongjing County has attracted much attention from the society. In order to ensure the personal safety of tourists, it will be temporarily closed to the public from 12 o'clock on December 19.
In the past few days, the staff of the Gansu cultural relics department has carried out safety inspections and hidden danger investigations on the cave cultural relics, cliff plank roads, infrastructure, etc., and at present, the Bingling Temple grottoes have reached the opening requirements. According to the staff of the institute, on the first day of the opening of the Bingling Temple Grottoes, it is currently in the off-season for tourism, and there are few tourists.
Bingling Temple Grottoes is located in the small stone mountain in the southwest of Yongjing County, was built in the first year of Jianhong in the Western Qin Dynasty, is famous for preserving the earliest chronological inscription of Chinese grottoes, there are 216 existing cave niches, 815 stone carvings and clay statues, and about 1000,1961 square meters of murals. In <>, the Bingling Temple Grottoes were announced by the State Council as the first batch of national key cultural relics protection units, and are one of the heritage sites of the World Cultural Heritage "Silk Road: Road Network of Chang'an-Tianshan Corridor". (ENDS)