A powerful earthquake struck the Pacific island nation of Vanuatu on Tuesday, destroying buildings in the capital, Port Vila, including one housing the embassies of the United States and other countries. A witness told Agence France-Presse of bodies seen in the city.
Dan McGarry, a journalist with the Vanuatu-based Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, told the Reuters news agency in an interview that police said at least one person had been killed and injured people had been transported to the ‘hospital.
“This is the strongest earthquake I have experienced in my 21 years of living in Vanuatu and the Pacific Islands. I have seen many big earthquakes, never one like this,” he said.
The magnitude 7.3 earthquake struck at a depth of 35 miles, off the coast of Efate, Vanuatu’s main island, at 12:47 p.m. local time, according to the US Geological Survey.
The ground floor of a building housing the American, French and other embassies was crushed beneath the upper floors, resident Michael Thompson told AFP by satellite phone after posting images of the destruction on social media. social.
“It no longer exists. It’s just completely flat. The top three floors are still standing, but they fell,” Thompson said.
“If there was anyone in there at the time, then they’re gone.”
Thompson said the ground floor housed the U.S. Embassy, but that could not immediately be confirmed.
A photo shows significant damage to the building:
STR/AFP via Getty Images
The United States has closed the embassy until further notice, citing “considerable damage” to the mission, the U.S. Embassy in Papua New Guinea said in a social media post. “Our thoughts are with all those affected by this earthquake,” the embassy said.
The New Zealand High Commission, housed in the same building, suffered “significant damage”, said a statement from the office of Foreign Minister Winston Peters, adding that “New Zealand is deeply concerned about the significant earthquake in Vanuatu and the damage it caused. cause. »
Thompson, who runs a zipline adventure business in Vanuatu, said: “There are people in the buildings in the city. There were dead bodies when we passed by. »
A landslide on a road covered a bus, he said, “so there are obviously fatalities there.”
The quake also destroyed at least two bridges and most mobile networks were cut, Thompson said.
“They are just launching a rescue operation. The support we need from abroad is medical evacuation and trained relief, the type(s) of people capable of operating in the event of an earthquake,” he said.
STR/AFP via Getty Images
Video footage released by Thompson and verified by AFP showed uniformed rescuers and emergency vehicles working on a building whose exterior roof had collapsed onto a number of parked cars and trucks.
City streets were littered with broken glass and other debris from damaged buildings, footage showed.
Nibhay Nand, a Sydney-based pharmacist with businesses in the South Pacific, said he spoke to staff in Port Vila who told him most of the store had been “destroyed” and other buildings nearby had “collapsed”.
“We are waiting for everyone to tune in to find out how devastating and traumatic this will be,” Nand told AFP.
A tsunami warning was issued after the quake, with waves reaching up to one meter in parts of Vanuatu, but it was quickly lifted by the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre.
Earthquakes are common in Vanuatu, a low-lying archipelago of 320,000 people that straddles the seismic Ring of Fire, an arc of intense tectonic activity that extends across Southeast Asia and across the Pacific basin.
Vanuatu is ranked among the countries most vulnerable to natural disasters such as earthquakes, storms, floods and tsunamis, according to the annual Global Risks Report.