Recent Earthquakes in California and Nevada
2-degree map
—> Please visit our reorganized earthquake pages at – http://quake.usgs.gov/ <—
including new CA-NV pages at – http://quake.usgs.gov/recenteqs/latest.htm
Update time = Sun Apr 4 15:43:17 PDT 2010
Here are the 30 most recent earthquakes and all M>4 earthquakes on this map…
MAG DATE LOCAL-TIME LAT LON DEPTH LOCATION
y/m/d h:m:s deg deg km
The injured were ferried to hospital with the help of relatives
A strong earthquake has struck eastern Turkey, killing at least 57 people, officials have said.
The 6.0-magnitude quake, centred on the village of Basyurt in Elazig province, struck at 0432 (0232 GMT). It has been followed by more than 40 aftershocks.
Officials said the nearby village of Okcular had been almost destroyed and several others badly damaged.
A number of people were trapped in the rubble of collapsed buildings, many of which were built of mud-bricks.
“Villages consisting mainly of mud-brick houses have been damaged, but we have minimal damage such as cracks in buildings made of cement or stone,” Elazig Governor Muammer Erol told CNN Turk.
Everything has been knocked down – there is not a stone in place Yadin Apaydin Administrator for Yukari Kanatli.
At least 17 of the dead came from the hillside village of Okcular, where up to 30 houses collapsed, rescuers said.
“The village is totally flattened,” Okcular’s administrator, Hasan Demirdag, told NTV.
Television footage from Okcular showed rescue workers and soldiers digging among the rubble of collapsed buildings as villagers looked on.
Ali Riza Ferhat, a resident, said he had been asleep in his home when the earthquake struck.
“I tried to get out of the door but it wouldn’t open. I came out of the window and started helping my neighbours,” he told NTV. “We removed six bodies.”
The nearby villages of Yukari Kanatli, Kayalik, Gocmezler and Yukari Demirci were also badly damaged and each reported several deaths.
Map showing Turkey quake location
“Everything has been knocked down – there is not a stone in place,” Yadin Apaydin, the administrator for Yukari Kanatli, told CNN Turk.
At least 50 people have been taken to hospital, officials say. Some were reportedly hurt during the panic after the first earthquake, when they jumped from windows or balconies.
Residents of the affected villages have been warned not to return to damaged homes while the area continues to be hit by aftershocks, the strongest of which have so far measured 5.1 and 5.5.
The government disaster management centre and Turkish Red Crescent have set up tents to help survivors cope with the harsh winter weather, and are also distributing food and blankets.
Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek and three other ministers have travelled to the earthquake zone to provide assistance.
Elderly woman stands next to her collapsed home (8 March 2010)
We’ve experienced so many earthquakes in the last 20 years, yet no measures have been taken to strengthen the buildings
Volkan Durkal
In Ankara, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan lamented the lack of earthquake-safe buildings and said he had ordered the start of a reconstruction project in the area.
“Mud-brick construction is undoubtedly a local tradition. But unfortunately, it has proved to have a heavy price,” he said.
A BBC News website reader who visited the village of Basyurt after the earthquake said its residents blamed the government for the destruction and loss of life.
“This is a seismic area. We’ve experienced so many earthquakes in the last 20 years, yet no measures have been taken to strengthen the buildings,” Volkan Durkal said.
“Most houses are not made with cement, they are not well-built and the people are not well-educated about what to do and where to take cover during an earthquake.”
Turkey is plagued by earthquakes – generally minor – because of its location on the North Anatolian fault line.
A 7.4-magnitude tremor which hit the western city of Izmit in August 1999 killed more than 17,000 people.
The BBC’s Jonathan Head in Istanbul says poor quality buildings were also blamed for the high death toll then and there is still concern in Turkey’s largest city, where seismologists predict a major earthquake will occur within the next few decades.
Tags: Aftershocks, Ali Riza, Bbc, Bbc News, Brick Houses, Cern, Cnn, Cnn Turk, Collapsed Buildings, Death Toll, Deaths, Demirci, Earthquake, Earthquake Turkey, Earthquake Zone, Earthquakes, Eastern Turkey, Erol, Fault Line, Gmt, Hillside Village, Hospital Officials, Magnitude Quake, Minimal Damage, Muammer, Mud Brick Houses, Mud Bricks, Nato, Nearby Village, Nearby Villages, Quake, Quake Hits, Quake Zone, Rescuers, Rubble, Seismic Area, Six Bodies, Survivors, Television Footage, Turkey Quake, Villager, Weather
By David Barrett
Published: 1:37PM GMT 27 Feb 2010
Chile’s President Michelle Bachelet declares a ’state of catastrophe’ Photo: AP
An evacuation of coastal areas on Easter Island was under way as the tsunami was expected to make landfall there imminently.
An image generated by NOAA West Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center shows the projected tsunami travel times following an earthquake that struck Chile Photo: REUTERS
Michelle Bachelet, the Chilean President, said an evacuation of coastal areas on Easter Island, the Chilean territory famous for its monumental statues, was under way as the tsunami was expected to make landfall there imminently.
British experts said a tsunami was now radiating from the epicentre towards Hawaii and other settlements on the Pacific Ring of Fire.
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The extent of the tsunami’s ferocity is not yet known, but it has already reached the southern Juan Fernandez Islands, about 400 miles off the coast of Chile, where it was reported to have caused “serious damage”.
The islands include one named after Robinson Crusoe, Daniel Defoe’s protagonist, and another named after Alexander Selkirk, the Scottish sailor whose real life experiences as a castaway are said to have inspired the 1719 novel.
An alert was issued by the US Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre which predicted damage to the Hawaiian coast from 9pm GMT today.
“Urgent action should be taken to protect lives and property,” the centre said in a bulletin. “All shores are at risk no matter which direction they face.”
The centre had earlier issued a tsunami warning for Chile and Peru, and a tsunami watch for Ecuador, Colombia, Antarctica, all of Central America and French Polynesia.
New Zealand also issued a tsunami alert, warning of a wall of water up to 10 feet high, with landfall due there at just after 6pm GMT.
The New Zealand National Crisis Management Centre warning said the greatest wave heights were expected between six and 12 hours after the initial arrivals.
Dr Brian Baptie, the British Geological Survey’s Head of Seismology, said: “This is largest earthquake to strike central Chile since a magnitude 6.7 earthquake in 2001.
“A 1.3 metre tsunami wave was observed at Valparaiso, 200 kilometres north of the epicentre about 20 minutes after the earthquake.
“Tsunami waves in the deep ocean travel about the same speed as a jet plane and would take about 15 hours to reach Hawaii and about 20 hours to reach the other side of the Pacific.”
Dr David Rothery, from the Open University’s Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, said: “This morning’s magnitude 8.8 earthquake close to the Chilean coast has caused a tsunami that is now radiating away from the epicentre and travelling at several hundred kilometres per hour across the Pacific Ocean.
“The first waves are expected to Hawaii at 11:19 Hawaii Standard Time but are also travelling along the South America coast and will reach Colombia and Costa Rica after 1300 GMT.
He added: “A magnitude 8 quake is a rare event. On average there is only about one of these per year globally.”
Japan’s meteorological agency warned of a tsunami risk across large areas of the Pacific, as far away as the Antarctic, and in the Philippines officials warned low-lying coastal areas to prepare for a possible evacuation.
By KIRK JOHNSON
Published: January 31, 2010
DENVER — In the last two weeks, more than 100 mostly tiny earthquakes a day, on average, have rattled a remote area of Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, putting scientists who monitor the park’s strange and volatile geology on alert.
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Researchers say that for now, the earthquake cluster, or swarm — the second-largest ever recorded in the park — is more a cause for curiosity than alarm. The quake zone, about 10 miles northwest of the Old Faithful geyser, has shown little indication, they said, of building toward a larger event, like a volcanic eruption of the type that last ravaged the Yellowstone region tens of thousands of years ago.
The area is far from any road or community, and the park is relatively empty in winter. Swarms of small quakes, including a significant swarm last year, are relatively common.
But at a time when the disastrous earthquake in Haiti on Jan. 12 has refocused global attention on the earth’s immense store of tectonic energy, scientists say that the Yellowstone swarm, if only because of its volume, bears close observation: as of Sunday, there had been 1,608 quakes since Jan. 17.
“We’re not seeing a pattern that is really discernible yet,” said Henry Heasler, a coordinating scientist for the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory, a joint venture of Yellowstone, the United States Geological Survey and the University of Utah. Dr. Heasler said plans were in place to intensify observations in case the swarm continued for a long time or got larger. “We’re ready to ramp up,” he said, including using flights to monitor the area.
Researchers at the University of Utah’s Seismograph Stations who have tracked Yellowstone swarms said they thought it was coincidental that another big swarm of more 1,000 quakes had struck the park just over a year ago. At the time, it was the second-biggest cluster recorded there. The largest swarm was in 1985, when 3,000 earthquakes struck over three months.
Last year’s swarm, beneath northern Yellowstone Lake, had a specific track of alignment, with the earthquakes moving north and growing shallower from the initial quake area, said Robert B. Smith, a professor of geophysics at the University of Utah and a science coordinator at the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory.
The mostly smaller quakes in the current swarm, he said, are more like a cloud, with no directional pattern, similar to what scientists saw in a big swarm at the park in 1999. “We think the crust beneath Yellowstone is highly fractured already, so we’re getting stress release in these earthquakes — a displacement of millimeters,” Dr. Smith said.
Dr. Heasler said researchers use the park’s geologic wonders, like Old Faithful — which spews steam and water on schedule, plus or minus 10 minutes — as indicators of the effects of quake activity. He and his team look for changes in water temperature, or mud plumes in hot pools that otherwise run clear. This swarm, he said, seems not to have affected any of those natural monitors, though he emphasized that analysis was continuing.
Attention to earthquakes in general has soared since the quake in Haiti. For instance, visits to the United States Geological Survey’s Earthquake Hazards Program Web site increased fivefold after the quake, to more than a million a day, compared with the numbers a month earlier, an agency spokeswoman said.
Dr. Heasler said park visitors had been encouraged to help with the research by telling park officials if they felt the ground shake.
Tags: Cern, Close Observation, Disastrous Earthquake, Earthquake, Earthquakes, Energy Scientists, Geophysics, Global Attention, Haiti, Kirk Johnson, Nato, New York Times, Old Faithful Geyser, Plume, Quake, Quake Zone, Science News, Scientists, Seismograph Stations, Small Quakes, Steam, Swarms, United States, United States Geological, United States Geological Survey, University Of Utah, Volcanic Eruption, Volcano, Yellowstone National Park, Yellowstone Park, Yellowstone Region, Yellowstone Volcano ObservatoryQuake hits off Cayman Islands
January 19, 2010 — Updated 1813 GMT (0213 HKT)
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
* No immediate reports of injuries after earthquake off Cayman Islands
* “There was quite a bit of shaking,” says shop manager in George Town, Cayman Islands
* U.K. territory in Caribbean about 600 miles west of Port-au-Prince, Haiti
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* Earthquakes
* Cayman Islands
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(CNN) — A 5.8-magnitude earthquake struck Tuesday off the Cayman Islands, the U.S. Geological Survey said.
The 6.2-mile deep quake hit at 9:23 a.m. ET, 40 miles from George Town, Cayman Islands, the USGS reported. George Town, the capital, is on the western shore of Grand Cayman Island.
There were no immediate reports of injuries in the three-island chain in the Caribbean.
The British territory of the Cayman Islands is about 600 miles (1,000 kilometers) west of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, which was devastated last week by a 7.0-magnitude earthquake.
Tuesday’s quake struck about 32 miles (52 kilometers) east-southeast of Bodden Town in the center of the southern coast of Grand Cayman Island.
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It caused shaking at the Pedro St. James National Historic Site, about a 10-minute drive from Bodden Town, said Sonya Hydes, the gift shop manager.
“There was quite a bit of shaking,” she said.
Hydes said she called her husband after the shaking stopped to see if their house was affected. He told her that he felt the quake but that it did not damage their house.
There are reports that the quake toppled power lines in Bodden Town, said Kafara Augustine, a news producer for Cayman 27.
Augustine said she felt the shaking from within her office in central George Town. She and her colleagues quickly evacuated the building, seeking safety in the streets, she said. The two-story building did not suffer any damage and from what she could see, everything else seemed unharmed during the quake, she said.
The quake startled Davy Ebanks, general manager of the North Sound Club, a golf course on the Seven Mile Beach strip of western Grand Cayman Island. He said he was reading about the earthquake in Haiti on the Internet when he suddenly felt shaking.
“I just bolted,” he said. “It was rocking and rolling pretty good.”
The trembling knocked some picture frames off balance and sent some mannequins tumbling in the pro shop, but otherwise did little damage at the club, he said.
About 215 miles (346 kilometers) from the temblor in Cienfuegos, Cuba — a city on the southern coast of the communist island — residents said they felt nothing.
The Caymans are about 167 (268 kilometers) miles northwest of Jamaica and about 140 miles (240 kilometers) south of Cuba, according to the CIA World Fact Book.
Tags: British Territory, Cayman 27, Cayman Islands, Cnn, Earthquake, Earthquakes, East Southeast, Ebanks, Gift Shop, Gmt, Grand Cayman Island, Haiti, January 19, Kilometers, Magnitude Earthquake, Pedro St, Port Au Prince, Port Au Prince Haiti, Quake, Quake Hits, Share Photos, St James, Temblor, U S Geological Survey, Usgshttp://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/12/091217-west-mata-submarine-volcano-video.html
Spectacular Sea Eruption Filmed — Deepest Ever The video player is loading. If it does not appear shortly, you may need to enable JavaScript in your Web browser and/or get the latest Flash Player plug-in to view it. Email to a Friend View All News Videos What’s This? SHARE Digg StumbleUpon Reddit RELATED * VIDEO: Deep-Sea Eruption, Odd Animals Seen * Underwater Pictures December 17, 2009—See the recent “underwater Fourth of July” scientists believe is the deepest volcanic eruption ever seen—with three-foot-wide lava bubbles and flows creeping over the seafloor. © 2009 National Geographic; Video courtesy National Science Foundation and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Unedited Transcript Researchers witnessed a spectacular, fiery underwater volcano explosion, and captured it on video. Its believed to be the deepest ocean volcano eruption ever recorded. The undersea Pacific Ocean explosions in May of this year were recorded using a remote operating vehicle. Under the tone of the vehicle motors, recorded by a hydrophone, you can hear the muffled sounds of the explosions, still audible under 4,000 feet of ocean water. An expedition team, which included researchers from the University of Washington and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, was conducting observations in an area of the Pacific bounded by the island nations of Samoa, Tonga and Fiji. The eruption was southeast of Samoa. One of the lead scientists called it, an underwater Fourth of July. Images show large molten lava bubbles about three feet across; glowing red vents ejecting lava into the sea, and lava flows across the seafloor. This West Mata volcano stands more than a mile high off the ocean floor. Its eruptive area is about the length of a football field. It is producing Boninite lavas, believed to be among the hottest erupting on Earth in modern times. Researchers believe they have a unique chance to study magma formation and how the Earth recycles material where tectonic plates slide against each other. A microbiologist on the team found diverse microbes in the extreme conditions, and they observed a small species of shrimp thriving. Its believed to be the same shrimp species found at eruptive sites more than 3,000 miles away. Mission scientists believe 80 percent of eruptive activity on Earth occurs in the ocean, and most volcanoes are in the deep sea. But until this discovery, NOAA and the National Science Foundation had sponsored submarine volcano research for 25 years, without observing a deep-ocean eruption like this one, which is now recorded for all of us to see.
Tags: Deepest Ocean, Flash Player Plug, Fourth Of July Images, Hydrophone, Lava Bubbles, Lava Flows, Length Of A Football Field, Molten Lava, National Oceanic And Atmospheric Administration, National Science Foundation, Ocean Floor, Ocean Water, Odd Animals, Seafloor, Spectacular Sea, Submarine Volcano, Three Feet, Underwater Volcano, Volcanic Eruption, Volcano EruptionCURIOUS EVENTS IN NEBRASKA: Earthquakes don’t rock Nebraska very often. In fact, seismically speaking, it is one of the quietest places in North America. Nevertheless, on Dec. 16th at 8:54 pm CST, USGS seismographs detected a magnitude 3.5 temblor centered near Auburn, Nebraska:
Click to view earthquake details and Nebraska seismic probabilities
“It sounded like those loud grain haulers that drive by, but about five times louder,” reports Laurie Riley, who lives near the epicenter. “The whole house shook. My kids came running down stairs – they were scared. It even moved my car, [which was parked outside on icy ground].”
And then the really curious thing happened.
Minutes after the quake, around 9 pm CST, lightning-like flashes lit up the skies around the area of the quake. Telephones in police departments and TV stations rang with reports of bright lights, loud rumbles and shaking ground. Sky watchers, not only in southeastern Nebraska, but also in neighboring Oklahoma, Missouri and Kansas, saw a “bright fireball” with “green streamers” moving from northwest to southeast.
Could these events be connected? Nebraska State Trooper Jerry Chab, an experienced amateur astronomer who witnessed the lights and was one of the first to report them, says no. “I think we have the most cosmic of coincidences: A bright [meteoritic] fireball around the same time as an earthquake.” Indeed, eyewitness descriptions of the fireball are consistent with a meteoroid disintegrating in the atmosphere. On the other hand, several readers have pointed out scientific studies that associate lightning-like phenomena (including ball lightning) with earthquakes: #1, #2, #3. The fireball, they suggest, might have been a rare manifestation of “earthquake lightning.”
More reports could help sort out the possibilities. Readers with photos or eyewitness accounts are encouraged to submit their observations.
Tags: Amateur Astronomer, Auburn Nebraska, Ball Lightning, Bright Fireball, Bright Lights, Coincidences, Curious Events, Curious Thing, Epicenter, Eyewitness Accounts, Laurie Riley, Meteoroid, Nebraska State, Police Departments, Seismographs, Sky Watchers, Southeastern Nebraska, State Trooper, Streamers, Temblor![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=f40470e7-e466-4c37-9915-dcc475179a89)
By FILI SAGAPOLUTELE, For The Associated Press Fili Sagapolutele, For The Associated Press –
PAGO PAGO, American Samoa – Towering tsunami waves spawned by a powerful earthquake swept ashore on Samoa and American Samoa early Tuesday, flattening villages, killing at least 34 people and leaving dozens of workers missing at devastated National Park Service facilities.
Cars and people were swept out to sea by the fast-churning waters as survivors fled to high ground, where they remained huddled hours later. Hampered by power and communications outages, officials struggled to assess the casualties and damage.
The quake, with a magnitude between 8.0 and 8.3, struck around dawn about 20 miles below to ocean floor, 120 miles (190 kilometers) from American Samoa, a U.S. territory that is home to 65,000 people, and 125 miles (200 kilometers) from Samoa.
Mike Reynolds, superintendent of the National Park of American Samoa, was quoted as saying four tsunami waves 15 to 20 feet high roared ashore soon afterward, reaching up to a mile inland. Holly Bundock, spokeswoman for the National Park Service’s Pacific West Region in Oakland, Calif., said Reynolds spoke to officials from under a coconut tree uphill from Pago Pago Harbor and reported that the park’s visitor center and offices appeared to have been destroyed.
Bundock said Reynolds and another park service staffer had been able to locate only 20 percent of the park’s 13 to 15 employees and 30 to 50 volunteers. The National Park of American Samoa is the only national park south of the equator, a scenic expanse of reefs, picturesque beaches, tropical forests and wildlife that include sea turtles and flying foxes, a type of fruit bat.
Residents in both Samoa and American Samoa reported being shaken awake by the quake, which lasted two to three minutes. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center issued a general alert from American Samoa to New Zealand; Tonga suffered some coastal damage from 13-foot waves.
Mase Akapo, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in American Samoa, said at least 14 people were killed in four different villages on the main island of Tutuila, while 20 people died neighboring Samoa. The initial quake was followed by at three aftershocks of at least 5.6 magnitude.
An Associated Press reported saw the bodies of about 20 victims in a hospital at Lalomanu town on the south coast of the main island, Upolu, and said the surrounding tourist coast had been flattened, with the dead including those who hesitated to leave right after the quake.
An unspecified number of fatalities and injuries were reported in the Samoan village of Talamoa. New Zealander Graeme Ansell said the beach village of Sau Sau Beach Fale was leveled.
“It was very quick. The whole village has been wiped out,” Ansell told New Zealand’s National Radio from a hill near Samoa’s capital, Apia. “There’s not a building standing. We’ve all clambered up hills, and one of our party has a broken leg. There will be people in a great lot of need ’round here.”
The Samoan capital was virtually deserted with schools and businesses closed.
Local media said they had reports of some landslides in the Solosolo region of the main Samoan island of Upolu and damage to plantations in the countryside outside Apia.
American Samoa Gov. Togiola Tulafono was at his Honolulu office assessing the situation but was having difficulty getting information, said Filipp Ilaoa, deputy director of the office.
Rescue workers found a scene of destruction and debris with cars overturned or stuck in mud, and rockslides hit some roads. Several students were seen ransacking a gas station/convenience store.
Rear Adm. Manson Brown, Coast Guard commander for the Pacific region, said the Coast Guard is in the early stages of assessing what resources to send to American Samoa. Coast Guard spokesman Lt. John Titchen said a C-130 was being dispatched Wednesday to deliver aid, asssess damage and take the governor back home. A New Zealand air force P3 Orion maritime search airplane also was being sent.
One of the runways at Pago Pago (Pan-go, pan-go) International Airport was being cleared of widespread debris for emergency use, Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor said in Los Angeles.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency said it was deploying teams to American Samoa to provide support and on the ground assessment.
“Our thoughts and prayers go out to the people of American Samoa and all those in the region who have been affected by these natural disasters,” Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said.
The ramifications of the tsunami could be felt thousands of miles away, with federal officials saying strong currents and dangerous waves were forecast from California to Washington state. No major flooding was expected, however.
The earthquake and tsunami were big, but not on the same large scale of the 2004 Indonesian tsunami that killed more than 150,000 across Asia the day after Christmas in 2004, said tsunami expert Brian Atwater of the U.S. Geological Survey in Seattle.
The 2004 earthquake was at least 10 times stronger than the 8.0 to 8.3 measurements being reported for Tuesday’s quake, Atwater said. It’s also a different style of earthquake than the one that hit in 2004.
The tsunami hit American Samoa about 25 minutes after the quake, which is similar to the travel time in 2004, Atwater said. The big difference is there were more people in Indonesia at risk than in Samoa.
___
Associated Press writer Keni Lesa in Apia, Samoa, Ray Lilley in Wellington, New Zealand, Jaymes Song in Honolulu and Seth Borenstein and Michele Salcedo in Washington contrinuted to this report.
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Strong earthquake rocks Venezuela
Sat Sep 12, 2009 8:09pm EDT
By Frank Jack Daniel
CARACAS (Reuters) – A strong 6.4 magnitude earthquake shook major oil exporter Venezuela on Saturday, causing panic in the capital, Caracas, and injuring at least seven people when houses in the countryside collapsed.
The quake, the strongest in the South American nation in years, hit at about 3:40 p.m. local time (2010 GMT), authorities said. It also knocked out power in several regions.
The head of Venezuela’s emergency services, Luis Diaz Curbelo, said the quake was felt across the country, but the northwestern state of Falcon was the hardest hit with seven people hurt and some buildings damaged.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the epicenter was 23 miles north-northeast of Puerto Cabello, one of the OPEC nation’s main oil ports. It was below the sea at a depth of 6.2 miles.
There was no damage to any oil installation, a source at state oil company PDVSA said.
In Caracas several people were slightly hurt when thousands of shoppers stampeded out of one of the city’s largest malls. In the countryside, the walls of some houses made from mud and straw bricks collapsed.
Television reported aftershocks in some regions.
One of Venezuela’s main oil refineries, El Palito, and a petrochemicals complex are located in the region where the tremor was felt most strongly.
The quake also hit the country’s oil heartland of Zulia, where buildings wobbled in state capital Maracaibo.
PUBLIC PANIC
As in other cities and towns, Caracas residents fled high-rise buildings and streamed into the streets.
“I was having my hair cut when suddenly the chair started wobbling,” said Caracas resident Andrea Reyna, who evacuated a hairdressing salon along with a dozen others.
“It was very strong, really frightening. The whole shop rattled. Now I can’t get through to my children on the phone to see if they’re OK.”
Residents of apartment blocks gathered in public spaces in case of aftershocks.
“You never know. I’m not taking any risks,” said Juan Fernando Lopez, standing next to a swimming pool with his three children outside one upmarket apartment block.
Cellular telephone networks jammed with the flood of calls after the tremor. A Reuters witness said power was out in one part of Caracas, and media reports said other regions were without electricity.
But Hipolito Izquierdo, head of the national electricity company, said on state television that “the electricity service is normal everywhere in the nation.”
Quakes registering magnitude 6.0 or higher are considered capable of severe damage. Earlier the USGS reported said the temblor was a magnitude 7.0 quake.
“The security forces are working to gather reports of damage, in actions to recover any services, electricity, telephones, gas or water that may have failed because of the earthquake,” said Jesse Chacon, minister of light industry and a close aide to President Hugo Chavez.
(Additional reporting by Eyanir Chinea, Patricia Rondon, Marianna Parraga and Andrew Cawthorne in Caracas; Manuel Hernandez in Maracaibo; Editing by Xavier Briand)
Tags: Aftershocks, Apartment Blocks, Curbelo, Earthquake, Earthquake Rocks, Electricity, Epicenter, Gmt, Hairdressing Salon, High Rise Buildings, Luis Diaz, Magnitude Earthquake, Northwestern State, Oil Exporter, Oil Installation, Oil Refineries, Ok Residents, Palito, Pdvsa, Public Panic, Puerto Cabello, Quake, Reuters, South American Nation, State Oil Company, Temblor, U S Geological Survey, Zulia
