NEPAL TORN, 1,300 DEAD

Worst earthquake in 81 years brings Himalayan nation to its knees Two Indians among the dead in Nepal, mission suffers heavy damage Strong tremors, aftershocks bring death to India, Bangladesh, Tibet

A powerful earthquake jolted Nepal and sent tremors through northern India on Saturday, killing over 1,300 people — with the toll expected to mount further — levelling centuries-old temples and triggering a deadly avalanche on Mount Everest. The dead included two Indians.

The 7.9- magnitude earthquake, Nepal’s worst in 81 years, left a swathe of destruction from the alleys of Kathmandu to remote mountainous areas as a breakdown in communications hampered relief efforts and raised fears of a humanitarian disaster across the Himalayan nation of 28 million people.

Residents ran out of homes in panic after walls crumbled reducing buildings to rubble and large cracks opened up on streets following the earthquake with its epicentre 77km northwest of Kathmandu. Local TV footage showed Nepalese soldiers digging through the rubble with their bare hands and people rushing the injured to hospital.

An Indian embassy employee’s daughter died and his wife suffered serious injuries when a house in the mission complex collapsed. Another Indian death was reported from a hospital in Kathmandu but there were no immediate details. Reports of about 300 Indians stranded in Nepal emerged as the air force prepared to launch evacuation operations.

Apart from the devastation in Kathmandu, at least 18 people were killed when the avalanche swept through the Everest Base Camp, crowded with foreign mountaineers and their Sherpa teams at the start at the climbing season.

Climbers pleaded for help after the avalanche destroyed camps and sent slabs of ice crashing. “Running for life from my tent. Unhurt. Many many people up the mountain,” tweeted Romanian climber Alex Gavan, who had been preparing to ascend nearby Lhotse, the world’s fourth-highest peak.

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