Posted on 08/24/2016 6:41:30 AM PDT by Rockitz
The scale of the devastating Italian earthquake was laid bare this morning as shocking pictures and terrifying eyewitness accounts revealed how four towns were almost wiped off the map in just a matter of seconds.
At least 63 people were killed, including two babies, and 150 people are missing, believed to be trapped under rubble after the 6.2-magnitude quake struck at 3.30am local time while villagers slept in their beds.
Today rescuers spoke of hearing children's screams from the rubble and locals were spotted frantically digging with their bare hands to try and save loved ones.
The quake which devastated the Umbrian mountainside towns and villages of Amatrice, Accumoli, Arquata del Tronto and Pescara del Tronto was so powerful that it even rocked buildings in the centre of Rome more than 100 miles away and was felt as far away as Croatia.
Survivors today described 'apocalyptic' scenes in towns and villages near the city of Perugia - the capital of the tourist-packed Umbrian region, which is especially popular with British holidaymakers.
The quake's epicentre was near Norcia in Umbria, about 105 miles north east of Rome, and falling bridges and landslides meant some areas are still cut off with emergency teams only able to get there on foot.
The mayor of Accumoli, Stefano Petrucci, said this morning: 'My town isn't here anymore' as people were carried out of ruined buildings on stretchers and people desperately searched the debris for survivors or sobbed as they inspected their own ruined homes.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
Historical note:
On this day (August 24), in the year 79 AD, Vesuvius erupted and buried the towns of Pompeii & Herculaneum.
We were just in Italy earlier this month...a week in the town of Loro Ciuffenna (about midway between Florence & Arezzo) & then a few days in Rome. Those old stone buildings are beautiful, but definitely not something to be in during an earthquake!
I imagine most of the building predate earthquake building codes.
Strong self reliant people who tend to deal with crises don't seem to get the attention that third world types do. Just the way it is.
There was a tornado that hit (I can't remember where) a somewhat working class region of some mid Atlantic state years back and it barely made any news. The people there rose up dealt with the devastation themselves.
It breaks my heart, looking at the damage and loss of life there.
I imagine that a lot of those buildings were built before there were codes.
Poor or old construction is a huge factor. Also it’s not just magnitude that determines the amount of shaking and damage. It’s also a function of distance, depth and the type of soil.
You are really going out on a limb with this prediction . (Since there are dozens, if not hundreds of earthquakes around the globe each day, Judgment Day, whenever it occurs, will always be preceded by earthquakes.)
I read that it was a very shallow earthquake, epicenter only 4 km down, so that there was a lot more surface shaking for the measured power (Most quakes are a lot deeper so a 6.2 would not be as bad at the surface as in this case). But anyway, 6.2 is a pretty major quake.
Was thinking the same as I was in 6.9 in Oly, Wa.
It was an uncertain time for me, at the time. What concerned me most was the collapse of that double decker freeway near there. Horrible to think about being crushed like that.
Certainly those buildings have seen other Earthquakes. Wonder why this one was the one that did them in?
RIP.
Aw. Sorry it was hard for you.
We lost our well and fema sent us some money to have it cleaned.
And I must say I am glad to no longer be living in quake country.
I was in Mountain View for that, at GTE. My basement office had a drop-ceiling made of 4-inch reinforced concrete. I, of course, dropped under the old battleship steel desk.
I didn’t think 6.2 was all that destructive, particularly in an area prone to these events.
I don’t mean to imply I was in significant danger. Sure, the building shook like 3 ft back and forth and everything in it tumbled down afterwards and you could see massive cracks, etc. on leaving.
But reports I was hearing about other places nearby (like the expressway) were what was distressing. I survived my part in all of that, and I survived other times and places, too. This one just hit me as something in which you have no control except the fortune of happenstance time and place.
Bammy is not going to help the Italians. He sent $50,000 to the victims of an earthquake a few years ago, a deliberate insult.
Hope I’m wrong, but it looks like that 73 number will climb.
My heart goes out to them.
Now they are saying 73 dead.
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