Triggered by inconsistencies and omissions in the reporting of casualty statistics and earthquake magnitude of the 1976 Tangshen (China) earthquake, this paper examines coverage of the natural disaster by "Peking Review," China's only foreign language news weekly. The paper's main section analyzes in detail "Peking Review's" coverage (in five consecutive issues in August and September 1976, as well as in follow-up stories--three before the earthquake's first anniversary and two articles in 1979 and 1986), examining how China handled the earthquake journalistically and practically, and why. The next section discusses the inconsistencies in earthquake magnitude and casualty figures reported in the international press and in the Chinese press, as well as disparities in the figures reported at different times in "Peking Review." The paper takes into account Chinese journalistic practices, the relationship between the press and the Chinese Communist Party, and the impact of politics on journalism in China at that time. Sixty-six endnotes are included, and an appendix contains three maps. (SR)