Philippines quake kills dozens in old buildings

A POWERFUL earthquake measuring 7.2 struck islands popular with tourists in the Philippines yesterday, killing at least 67 people, some as they prayed in a centuries-old church, and causing widespread damage to infrastructure, officials said.

Low-rise buildings collapsed on at least two islands and historic churches cracked and crumbled during the quake, which sparked panic, cut power and transport links and forced hospitals to evacuate patients.

At least 57 people died in collapsed structures and landslides on the island of Bohol, about 630km south of the capital, Rey Balido, spokesman for the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, said at army headquarters.

He said nine others died in Cebu and another on Siquijor island. Nearly 170 were wounded on Cebu and Bohol islands.

President Benigno Aquino said he would visit quake-damaged areas today. “Many of the structures there are old,” he said.

The death toll looks set to rise. As many as 77 people had died in 11 towns on the island, much of which was left without power and communications, Dennis Agustin, Bohol provincial police director, said in a radio interview.

Four bridges collapsed and roads cracked, with many declared impassable due to landslides, prompting the authorities to declare a state of calamity in the province, along with Cebu.

Renato Solidum, head of the state seismology agency, said the magnitude 7.2-tremor had struck near Carmen on Bohol island at 8.12am. “A magnitude 7 earth- quake has energy equivalent to around 32 Hiroshima atomic bombs. Compared to the 2010 Haiti earthquake — that had a magnitude of 7, this one had a magnitude of 7.2, slightly stronger,” he said.

The volcanology agency said it was measured at a depth of about 56km. Hospitals moved patients to open spaces as aftershocks rocked Cebu, a city of about 870,000 people.