Killer quake destroys Italian hilltop villages
At least 18 dead, dozens still missing
APOWERFUL 6.2-magnitude earthquake devastated mountain villages in central Italy yesterday, leaving at least 18 people dead and dozens more injured or unaccounted for.
Scores of buildings were reduced to dusty piles of masonry close to the epicentre of the predawn quake in a remote area straddling the regions of Umbria, Marche and Lazio.
Deaths were reported in the villages of Amatrice, Accumoli and Arquata del Tronto as residents and emergency services battled frantically to rescue people trapped beneath the ruins after the quake hit while people were sleeping.
It was Italy’s most powerful earthquake since 2009, when about 300 people died around the city of Aquila, just to the south of the area hit yesterday.
Prime Minister Matteo Renzi cancelled a planned trip to France to oversee the response to the disaster.
“The situation is dramatic – there are many dead,” Amatrice mayor Sergio Pirozzi said. “Half the village has disappeared.”
Pope Francis interrupted his weekly audience in St Peter’s Square to express his shock.
“To hear the mayor of Amatrice say his village no longer exists and knowing that there are children among the victims is very upsetting for me,” he said.
Italy’s civil protection service head Fabrizio Curcio classed the quake as “severe”. The shocks were strong enough to wake residents of Rome, 150km away.
The worst damage was suffered by Pescara del Tronto, a hamlet near Arquata in the Marche region, which civil protection workers described as having been virtually razed.
Ten bodies had been recovered by mid-morning and rescuers were braced for further fatalities.
Arquata mayor Aleandro Petrucci said Pescara had “just completely disintegrated”.
Another two people died and a family of four including two young children were trapped, feared dead, in their collapsed house in Accumoli, according to mayor Stefano Petrucci.
“We have a tragedy here,” he said. “There are people under the ruins; it is not a good situation.”
A village resident told Rai television that she had been woken by the shaking in time to witness the wall of her bedroom cracking open. She was able to escape into the street with her children.
In Amatrice, the president of the Lazio region confirmed six bodies had been recovered.
The village was packed with visitors at the peak of the summer season when the quake struck, destroying the picturesque hilltop village’s main street.
The mayor said difficult access to the village had prevented emergency services getting through.
“There is a landslide on one road, a bridge is about to collapse on the other one.”
The first quake struck shortly after 3.30am, the US Geological Survey said, and a 5.4-magnitude aftershock an hour later. — AFP