"I thought we would never see each other again," said the 40-year-old civil servant from Guanghan, about 120 km from Zhongxing.
Together with six retired high school teachers from Guanghan, Hong's parents had been staying in a rural resort in mountainous Sanxi village in Zhongxing since June 26 to escape the summer heat.
After a landslide caused by rains hit Sanxi on Wednesday, burying eight of the resorts where many senior citizens were staying, Hong was unable to contact her parents until they met at noon on Thursday because communications were cut.
"Soon after learning about the landslide from the Internet, I rushed to Zhongxing, where I spent a sleepless night," said Hong, wiping away tears.
Her parents were among 352 tourists and villagers evacuated from the scene of the landslide on Wednesday and Thursday, according to Chen Jianfu, an official in Zhongxing.
"Sanxi had 800 residents before the landslide. Some 200 are staying in classrooms and dormitories at Zhongxing High School," he said.
Wu Sufang, 71, and her six family members were evacuated to the school from their home in Sanxi on Wednesday afternoon.
"None of my family members had cash when we escaped from our home. But the government provided us with three free meals, and we have quilts donated by the army for the night," she said.
A total of 232 tourists and villagers from Sanxi arrived at the school, which is 8 km from the landslide site, on Thursday.
Hong Tongjin, who witnessed the landslide, said: "It took more than four hours to reach the school from Sanxi. Despite a bus being provided by the local government, sometimes we had to walk in water up to our knees.
"The landslide buried the eight rural resorts within several minutes. I was more scared than in the Wenchuan earthquake (which hit Sichuan in 2008, killing nearly 70,000 people and leaving 17,923 missing). My house shook in the Wenchuan quake, but I saw many people die in the landslide," he said.
China's Chongqing issues orange-coded alert of heat
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