YUXI, China — Many residents of this tiny village in the mountainous region of southwest China spent Saturday night in tents and makeshift shelters, too scared to sleep in their flimsy homes after an earthquake killed 188 people early that morning.

Roofs buckled, walls tumbled and windows broke after the earthquake shook houses and sent boulders tumbling down mountain sides onto the narrow road that leads into this valley of Lushan County near the epicenter of the earthquake, which Chinese authorities said had a preliminary magnitude of 7.

The aftermath was not nearly as serious as the 7.9-magnitude earthquake in 2008 that left more than 70,000 people dead in the Wenchuan area. But villagers who work in Chengdu, about 100 miles away, streamed back home Sunday morning, many on foot, the lucky ones on motorbikes, to check on their homes.