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A magnitude 6.5 quake rocked much of Pakistan and Afghanistan on Tuesday, sending panicked residents out of their homes and offices and frightening people in remote villages. At least 11 people have died in two countries.
More than 100 people were taken to hospitals in the Swat Valley region of Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in a state of shock, Pakistani emergency services spokesman Bilal Faizi told The Associated Press.
“These terrified people collapsed, and some of them collapsed due to the impact of the earthquake,” he said. Faizi said that most of them were later released from the hospital.
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Faizi and other officials said nine people had died as a result of roof collapses in various parts of northwestern Pakistan. Dozens of others were injured in an earthquake that hit Afghanistan and was also felt along the border with Tajikistan. The earthquake triggered landslides in some mountainous areas, disrupting traffic.
Taimoor Khan, a spokesman for the provincial disaster management authority for the northwest, said at least 19 mud-brick houses had collapsed in outlying areas. “We are still collecting damage data,” he said.
Due to the strong tremors, many people fled their homes and offices in the Pakistani capital Islamabad, some of them reciting verses from the Quran, Islam’s holy book. According to media reports, cracks appeared in some apartment buildings in the city.
In Afghanistan, Sharafat Zaman Amar, a Taliban health ministry spokesman, said at least two people were killed and about 20 injured in the Afghan earthquake.
Zaman Amar said: “Unfortunately, there could have been more casualties, as the earthquake was so strong that in most of the country all hospitals and medical institutions are ready to save people’s lives,” he added.
The scene was repeated in Kabul and other parts of Afghanistan.
“The earthquake was so strong and terrifying that we thought that houses were collapsing on us, all the people were screaming and were in shock,” said Shafiullah Azimi, a resident of Kabul.
Aziz Ahmad, 45, another Kabul resident, said: “It was the first time in my life that I experienced such a strong earthquake, everyone was terrified.” He added that he and all his neighbors did not leave the house for hours, fearing tremors. “We didn’t dare to go home.”
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The USGS said the epicenter of the 6.5-magnitude quake was 40 kilometers (25 miles) south-southeast of Yurma in the Hindu Kush mountainous region of Afghanistan, which borders Pakistan and Tajikistan. The earthquake occurred at a depth of 188 kilometers (116 miles) below the surface of the Earth, so it was felt over a large area.
Dr. Rahshinda Tausid was at her hospital in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore when the earthquake struck. “I quickly asked the patients to move to a safer place,” she said.
Khurram Shahzad, a resident of the Pakistani garrison town of Rawalpindi, said he was having lunch with his family at a restaurant when the walls began to sway.
“I quickly thought it was a big incident and we left the restaurant and left,” he told The Associated Press by phone. He said he saw hundreds of people standing in the streets.
A similar situation was in Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on the border with Afghanistan, where people were seen standing outside their homes and offices.
Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif said in a statement that he has asked disaster management officials to remain vigilant to deal with any situation.
Zabiullah Mujahid, a senior Taliban government official in Afghanistan, tweeted that the health ministry has ordered all medical centers to go on standby.
The area is subject to strong seismic shocks. A magnitude 7.6 earthquake in 2005 killed thousands of people in Pakistan and Kashmir.
Last year, a magnitude 6.1 earthquake hit southeastern Afghanistan in rugged mountainous terrain, destroying stone and mud-brick houses. The Afghan Taliban rulers put the total death toll from the quake at 1,150, with hundreds injured, while the UN offered a lower estimate of 770.
Associated Press contributors Raheem Fayez in Islamabad, Riaz Khan in Peshawar, and Abdul Sattar in Quetta, Pakistan contributed to this report.
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