Dozens dead as quake rocks Italy

Rescuers use bulldozers, bare hands to look for survivors

At least 73 people were reported killed and dozens more were missing or feared dead Wednesday after a magnitude- 6.2 earthquake and a series of aftershocks struck several towns in central Italy, toppling scores of buildings, according to Italy’s civil protection agency.

Hardest hit were towns in the regions of Umbria, Lazio and Marche some 80 to 100 miles northeast of Rome.

Immacolata Postiglione, head of the civil protection agency, gave the breakdown at a briefing Wednesday but stressed the figures were still provisional.

Earlier, the Italian news agency ANSA reported at least 35 were killed in the town of Amatrice, 11 in Accumoli, near Rieti, and 17 in the province of Ascoli Piceno, which includes Pescara del Tronto.

As rescue teams using bulldozers and bare hands claw through piles of rubble, authorities warned the death toll is likely to rise.

Sergio Pirozzi, the mayor of Amatrice, told the Associated Press that rescue teams are trying to reach all 69 hamlets around his town.

“Half of the town doesn’t exist anymore,” Pirozzi told RAI- TV. “People are stuck underneath the rubble. Houses are no longer there.”

Police near the town of Ascoli said they could hear cries for help from under the rubble but lacked the heavy equipment to move the rocks, according the RAI radio.

In Accumoli, one witness told ANSA that fire and police teams looking for a young couple and

two children in a pile of rubble were alternating earth- moving equipment with individuals using bare hands.

Several buildings collapsed and lights went out after the earthquake, Pirozzi said. He said he had trouble communicating with emergency responders and couldn’t reach the hospital. The center of Amatrice was devastated, and homes collapsed on residents as they slept.

“The whole ceiling fell but did not hit me,” resident Maria Gianni told the AP. “I just managed to put a pillow on my head and I wasn’t hit luckily, just slightly injured my leg.”

The local hospital was also badly hit, forcing the wounded and stretcher- bearers to gather in front of the building. Ambulances then transferred patients to other towns.

The picturesque medieval town of about 3,000 residents — best known as the home of “pasta all’amatriciana” — is remote and was cut off after a bridge connecting the town and the rest of the region was damaged in the quake.

Search parties sifted through the rubble in various towns and villages as the sun rose. It became clear for some officials that the extent of the damage was worse than they initially thought.

“Now that daylight has come, we see that the situation is even more dreadful than we feared with buildings collapsed, people trapped under the rubble and no sound of life,” Stefano Pertucci, mayor of Accumoli mayor, told RAI- TV.

“We need chain saws, shears to cut iron bars, and jacks to remove beams: everything, we need everything,” civil protection worker Andrea Gentili told the AP.

Fabrizio Curcio, the director of Italy’s civil protection agency, activated national emergency procedures. He said the quake was on par with one in L’Aquilla in 2009 that left more than 300 people dead.

Italy, which sits on two fault lines, is one of the most earth- quake- prone countries throughout Europe.

The first earthquake struck around 3: 30 a. m. local time near Norcia, a small town roughly 105 miles from Rome, according to the U. S. Geological Survey. No victims were reported there, but the quakes damaged buildings, according to RaiNews24.

“Much of our patrimony is damaged, but there are no victims,” Mayor Nicola Alemanno told RaiNews24. “That is the good news.”

Italian Premier Matteo Renzi, who is heading to the zone later Wednesday, says the immediate priority is to rescue any survivors.

In brief remarks, Renzi thanked rescue workers who dug through debris to reach residents crushed by their homes.

Renzi said that in times of trouble, Italy shows its true face. He added: “No family, no city, no hamlet will be left alone.”

The first quake was followed by at least 11 tremors in what the seismological center described as a “high aftershock rate.”

“Aftershock rate is high in # Italy following M6.2 and will likely continue in the coming days,” the center said in a tweet Wednesday.

The U. S. Embassy restricted all but essential official travel to the area and recommended that U. S. citizens defer travel in these areas as well.

In Rome, residents said they felt a long swaying followed by aftershocks.

“I could feel the ground shake and my three dogs started to go a little crazy, running around and barking,” Maurizio Serra, 56, told USA TODAY. “I could hear other dogs in other apartments.”

Serra, who lives on the fourth floor of a Renaissance- era building in the historical center of Rome, said he felt a couple of smaller quakes afterward.

“Thank God there was no serious damage in our building,” he said. The Italian earthquake institute ( INGV) reported 60 aftershocks in the four hours following the first quake, the strongest at 5.5.

A geologist in Poland says that earthquake was caused by the

“Half of the town doesn’t exist anymore ... People are stuck underneath the rubble. Houses are no longer there.” Sergio Pirozzi, mayor of Amatrice

slow but constant under- surface movement of the African Plate toward Europe. Jerzy Zaba of the Silesian University in Katowice, in southern Poland, said Wednesday that a wedge- shaped front of the African Plate is pressing into the Eurasian Plate in the Adriatic Sea region and pushes into the neighboring regions, like Italy’s Apennine Mountains.

The tension that accumulates leads to a sudden release in the form of under- surface rock movement that causes earth tremors.

Zaba told Polish PAP agency that the African Plate is moving northwards at the speed of up to 2 inches a year.

The 2009, 6.3- magnitude earthquake in L’Aquila occurred roughly 55 miles south of the latest tremor.

The deadliest Italian earthquake in the 20th century struck in 1908, when a quake followed by a tsunami killed about 80,000 people in Reggio Calabria and Sicily.