Iran quake toll 400+
Rescuers dig
Rescuers dug with their bare hands Monday through the debris of buildings brought down by a powerful earthquake that killed more than 400 people in the mountainous border region between Iraq and Iran.
Sunday night’s magnitude-7.3 earthquake struck near the eastern Iraqi city of Halabja, according to the most recent measurements from the US Geological Survey.
It hit at 9:48 p.m. Iran time, just as people were going to bed.
The worst damage appeared to be in the Kurd- ish town of Sarpol-e-Zahab, which sits in the Zagros Mountains that divide Iran and Iraq.
Residents fled into the streets when the quake struck as apartment complexes collapsed into rubble. Outside walls of some complexes were sheared off and power and water lines were severed.
Residents dug frantically through wrecked buildings for survivors as they wailed. Firefighters from Tehran were using dogs to inspect the rubble.
The hospital in Sarpole-Zahab was heavily damaged, and the army set up field hospitals.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei immediately dispatched all government and military forces.
The quake could be felt 660 miles away on the Mediterranean coast. Nearly 120 aftershocks followed.
University of Colorado geological scientist Roger Bilham said earthquakes in the Zagros range, where there are more than 20 different faults, have killed more than 100,000 people in the last 1,000 years.