KATHMANDU: After the country’s worst disaster in eight decades killed 137 citizens and shook houses as far away as New Delhi, liberate workers in Nepal started digging through the rubble of collapsed buildings with their fingers on Saturday( Nov 4 ).
According to Nepal’s National Seismological Centre, the earthquake struck the Jajarkot region in the west of the Himalayan region at 11.47 pm( 1802 GMT ) on Friday with a 6.4 magnitude. Both the US Geological Survey and the German Research Centre for Geosciences measured it at 5.7 % and 5.6, respectively.
Since first responders had just arrived in the mountainous region near the epicentre, 500 kilometers west of Kathmandu’s capital, early on Saturday and started looking for survivors, officials worry that the death toll could increase.
Jajarkot city official Harish Chandra Sharma told Reuters over the phone that” the number of injured could be in the tens and the deaths may go away as well.”
The area’s poor quality of design and the fact that the earthquake struck while people were sleeping, according to officials, would probably cause significant damage and a high death toll, even though its magnitude was not severe.
They added that helicopters and small helicopters have been asked to be prepared to meet the energy and that rescue work was anticipated to take a while because crisis teams must first clear roads blocked by landslides in several locations.
Since 2015, when two tremors claimed the lives of approximately 9, 000 people, the earthquake is the deadliest. At a cost to the US economy of$ 6 billion, entire towns, centuries-old churches, and other traditional places were reduced to ruins at that time, along with more than one million homes.
According to officials, Jajarkot and the nearby Rukum West district in Karnali state both suffered fatalities of 99 and 38, respectively. The Ramidanda community served as the core.
In Jajarkot, which has a population of 190,000 with villages dispersed in distant hills, three cities and three villages were known to be affected, according to authorities.
According to a representative in the prime minister’s office, at least 85 people were hurt in Rukum West and 55 in Jajarkot.
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” Many homes have collapsed, and many more have developed breaks. According to Sharma, hundreds of locals spent the entire day in the chilly, open grounds because they were too terrified to enter the damaged homes as the aftershocks hit.
” I have been unable to enter myself.
Firefighters were seen using their bare fingers to sift through the rubble on local TV stations in search of victims in the remains of demolished homes. Individuals who had been hurt were seen being taken to a rescue helicopter so they could be transported to institutions.
Early on Saturday, Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal flew to the area with a 16-person military skilled staff to handle research, rescue, and relief, according to his office.
His business urged the people, political parties, and social workers to make donations to help pay for the survivors’ food, water, clothing, or tents.
According to army official Krishna Bhandari, a smaller plane carrying medical materials and health personnel was diverted to local Surkhet after failing to land in Chaurjahari’s Rukum area due to bad weather.
Local media film revealed multi-story brick homes with crumbling walls and large pieces of furniture strewn about. As some houses were evacuated, people were seen running into the city in movies on X.
Nearby, in New Delhi, around 600 km away, and various regions of north India, people could feel the tremors, which caused buildings to shake and forced people to flee into the street at odd hours of the night.
There have been no reports of any harm in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, two northeastern Indian states that border Nepal, according to authorities.
Narendra Modi, the prime minister of India, expressed his deep sorrow over the loss of life and harm in Nepal.
India is prepared to provide all necessary support and stands in cooperation with the Nepalese people. He posted on X,” Our thoughts are with the grieving people, and we wish the injured a speedy recovery.