At 14:28 on May 12, 2008, 7.8- magnitude earthquake hit Wenchuan County in Sichuan Province, more than 10 provinces in the country have been affected to varying degrees: villagers, cars buried by debris, whole town leveled after quake. The earthquake startles all over the world and are tearing at all Chinese people's heartstrings. Shortly after the earthquake, the leading group of earthquake relief and rescue work of CRSRI are established to be responsible for the disaster relief work, the staffs of CRSRI act immediately, they offer helping hands and donate eagerly to Sichuan quake-hit areas to help people suffering from the disaster to overcome difficulties, restore production and rebuild homes. By the end of May 23, three batches of donation were collected.

After the massive May 12 earthquake, a large amount of hydropower stations were damaged, reservoirs were in danger of collapse or in "highly dangerous" situations and 34 imprisoned lakes formed in Sichuan Province, posing great threats to the disaster areas. In order to prevent the earthquake-induced disasters happening, the first batch of experts from CRSRI hastened to the earthquake-stricken areas on May 16. Together with the experts form the Ministry of Water Resources, they have carried out field observations and assessments at the risk of their life, found out some dangerous conditions and made suggestions to the local water conservancy departments. The second batch of experts is awaiting orders to set out. On May 26, two blasting experts of CRSRI hurried to Mianyang to take part in the work of dealing with the emergency of Tangjiashan imprisoned lake.
 
The staffs of CRSRI believe that the material assistance and love and care may help enhance the confidence of people in the earthquake-stricken areas in their arduous endeavor to combat the disaster and rebuild their homes.