Powerful quake kills 144 in Myanmar, 10 in Thailand

Bangkok: A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighbouring Thailand on Friday, destroying buildings, a bridge and a dam. At least 144 people were killed in Myanmar, where photos and video from two hard-hit cities showed extensive damage. At least 10 died in the Thai capital, where a high-rise under construction collapsed.

The full extent of death, injury and destruction was not immediately clear – particularly in Myanmar, one of the world’s poorest countries.

It is embroiled in a civil war, and information is tightly controlled.

“The death toll and injuries are expected to rise,” the head of Myanmar’s military government, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing said as he announced on television that at least 144 people were killed and 730 others were injured in his country.

In Thailand, Bangkok city authorities said 10 people were killed, 16 injured and 101 missing from three construction sites, including the high-rise.

The 7.7 magnitude quake struck at midday, with an epicentre near Mandalay, Myanmar’s second-largest city. Aftershocks followed, one of them measuring a strong 6.4 magnitude.

Photos from Myanmar’s capital, Naypyidaw, showed rescue crews pulling victims from the rubble of multiple buildings used to house civil servants.

Myanmar’s government said blood was in high demand in the hardest-hit areas. In a country where prior governments sometimes have been slow to accept foreign aid, Min Aung Hlaing said Myanmar was ready to accept assistance.

At the United Nations, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the world body is mobilising to respond to Myanmar’s appeal for international help.

But as images circulated of buckled and cracked roads, a collapsed bridge and a burst dam, there were concerns about how rescuers would even reach some areas in a country already enduring a humanitarian crisis.

“We fear it may be weeks before we understand the full extent of destruction caused by this earthquake,” said Mohammed Riyas, the International Rescue Committee’s Myanmar director.

In Mandalay, the earthquake reportedly brought down multiple buildings, including the Ma Soe Yane monastery, one of the largest in the city, and damaged the former royal palace. A video posted online showed robed monks in the street, shooting their own video of the multistory monastery before it suddenly fell into the ground. It was not immediately clear whether anyone was harmed.

Christian Aid said its partners and colleagues on the ground reported that a dam burst in the city, causing water levels to rise in the lowland areas.

In the Sagaing region just southwest of the city, a 90-year-old bridge collapsed, and some sections of the highway connecting Mandalay and Myanmar’s largest city, Yangon, were also damaged.

Yangon residents rushed out of their homes when the quake struck. In Naypyitaw, some homes stood partly crumbled, while rescuers heaved away bricks from the piles of debris. An injured man reclined on a wheeled stretcher, while another man fanned him in the heat.

 In a country where many people already were struggling, “this disaster will have left people devastated,” said Julie Mehigan, who oversees Christian Aid’s work in Asia, the Middle East and Europe.

“Even before this heartbreaking earthquake, we know conflict and displacement has left countless people in real need,” Mehigan said.

In Thailand, a 33-story building under construction crumpled into a cloud of dust near Bangkok’s popular Chatuchak market, and onlookers could be seen screaming and running in a video posted on social media. Vehicles on a nearby freeway came to a stop.

Sirens blared across the Thai capital’s downtown as a rescuers streamed to the wreckage. Above them, shredded steel and broken concrete blocks, some stacked like pancakes, rose in a towering heap. Injured people were rushed away on gurneys, and hospital beds were also wheeled outside onto a sidewalk.

 “It’s a great tragedy,” Deputy Prime Minister Suriya Juangroongruangkit said after viewing the site, adding that there was hope that there were still survivors.

 The city’s elevated rapid transit system and subway shut down.