Over 800 killed in massive earthquake in Afghanistan, thousands injured
Rescue teams rushed to search for survivors along the border of Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region, where homes of mud and stone were levelled by the midnight quake, killing nearly 800
More than 800 people have been killed and thousands are injured in an earthquake that struck eastern Afghanistan today, September 1, the country's state-run broadcaster Radio Television Afghanistan (RTA) reported. The death toll from a powerful earthquake that struck eastern Afghanistan has risen to over 800, the Taliban government spokesman said Monday, with the majority in remote Kunar province.
Meanwhile, three villages were razed in the province of Kunar. Nurgal, Chawkay and Watapur were the districts of Kunar worst hit by the quake, Bakhtar reported.
Rescue teams rushed to search for survivors along the border of Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region, where homes of mud and stone were levelled by the midnight quake that hit at a depth of 10 km (6 miles).
"So far, no foreign governments have reached out to provide support for rescue or relief work," a foreign office spokesperson told Reuters.
Zabihullah Mujahed, spokesman of Taliban government in Afghanistan, said in on X that the quake caused loss of life and property damage in the eastern provinces, and rescue efforts are underway.
Earthquake Today: Quake of magnitude 6.0 rattle Afghanistan, tremors felt in Pakistan
A magnitude 6.0 earthquake struck about 27 kilometers (17 miles) east north east of Jalalabad in Afghanistan around midnight, the US Geological Survey reported. Tremors were also felt in Kabul and neighbouring Pakistan's capital Islamabad, around 370 kilometres (230 miles) away, for several seconds, AFP report said.
Following the intial earthquake, three or four aftershocks struck within a 30 minute period in the region, with magnitudes ranging between 4 and 5.
The epicentre of the quake, which struck at a relatively shallow depth of eight kilometres, was 27 kilometres from the city of Jalalabad in Nangarhar province, according to the US Geological Survey.
Shallow quakes tend to cause more damage than deep tremors.
Afghanistan is frequently hit by earthquakes, especially in the Hindu Kush mountain range, near the junction of the Eurasian and Indian tectonic plates.
Nangarhar province was also hit by flooding overnight Friday to Saturday, which killed five people and destroyed crops and property, provincial authorities said.