See: Earthquake knocks food off store shelves in Philippines
A pregnant woman has died, four people have been injured and nine others are missing after a powerful earthquake struck Mindanao, the Philippines’ second-largest island.
Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro said that 529 families have been affected.
The US Geological Survey measured the first quake late Saturday at magnitude 7.6, followed by four larger aftershocks exceeding 6.0.
The earthquake prompted tsunami warnings, which were later lifted.
The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology measured the quake at 7.4 and recorded at least 600 aftershocks with magnitudes ranging from 1.4 to 6.2.
image source, Facebook/PIA Surigao del Sur
After the first earthquake, people were evacuated from buildings and sheltered in open areas
Earlier, residents of the coastal areas of Surigao del Sur and Davao Oriental were told to evacuate to higher ground after the first quake struck at about 22:37 local time (14:37 GMT) off Mindanao’s east coast.
People in several cities far from the epicenter were seen evacuating buildings and sheltering in open areas. In Buduan city, patients were evacuated from the hospital.
In the municipality of Hinatuan – about 21 km from the epicenter – people gathered in evacuation centers. Disaster officials there are assessing damage and casualties in villages.
A disaster official in the city of Pilsig told AFP there were no reports of major damage to buildings or infrastructure so far, but some roads in the city in Surigao del Sur province cracked during the quake and aftershocks.
In Japan, northeast of the Philippines, tsunami waves of up to 0.4 m (1.3 ft) were later observed on some outlying islands.
The two island nations are part of the Pacific “Ring of Fire” – a zone of major seismic activity along one of the world’s most active fault lines.
The Mindanao quake comes two weeks after a 6.7-magnitude earthquake struck the island, killing at least nine people, shaking buildings and causing part of a shopping mall roof to collapse.
