| This is yesterday's quake, not a new one... |
 A strong earthquake jolted Pakistan in the early hours of Tuesday, bringing frightened survivors of the October 8 earthquake out of their tents and panicking people across northern parts of the country. There were no deaths reported. The earthquake measuring 6.7 on the Richter scale struck around 2:50am and its epicentre was in the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan, some 340 kilometres northwest of Islamabad. The damage was minimal because the quake originated over 200 kilometres below the earthâs surface, a Met Office official told APP. The quake was not an aftershock of the October 8 temblor, as was initially reported.
The jolts were felt in the areas of NWFP and Kashmir devastated by the October 8 quake and in Rawalpindi, Islamabad, Peshawar, Dir, Chitral, Abbottabad, Swat, Faisalabad, Lahore, Sialkot and Gujranwala. In Peshawar, several university students were injured in stampedes as they tried to rush out of their hostels. At least 40 university students were rushed to Khyber Teaching Hospital (KTH), most with minor injuries. Three more including a women were treated at Lady Reading Hospital. According to hospital sources, one Muhammad Haleem of the University of Peshawar jumped off his hostel roof and sustained serious head injuries.
| "Ooooh! Moh! That hadda hurt!" |
In Muzaffarabad, survivors of the October quake came out of their tents and homes and spent hours in the pre-dawn cold. âIt was very strong. People came out of their tents and started screaming and reciting verses from the Quran,â resident Sarfraz Ahmad told AFP.
| Nope. Still not Unitarians. Bob! Start getting another one ready! |
In Islamabad, the quake was felt for several seconds and people rushed out of their houses, particularly around the collapsed Margalla Towers, and into the bitter cold. Mobile phone networks were stalled after the earthquake as people made frantic calls to relatives. The earthquake triggered landslides in upper Hunza that blocked the Karakoram Highway. Gilgit residents said the quake also damaged boundary walls along hundreds of houses. In Afghanistan, some 100 houses were damaged and up to 400 cattle killed, but there were no reports of human casualties, Shamsur Rahman, deputy governor of Badakhshan province, told Reuters. |