A powerful 7.5-magnitude earthquake struck northeastern Afghanistan on Monday, killing at least 70 people there and also shook Pakistan and India. The quake lasted about one minute.
The victims included 12 girls who were students at a school in the Afghan province of Takhar, who were crushed in a stampede as they tried to flee their collapsing school. It is reported that at least 52 people,including eight children have died in Pakistan. Pakistani officials have said that the death toll is due to rise.
The earthquake’s epicentre was near Jurm in northeast Afghanistan, 250 km from capital Kabul, and at a depth of 213.5 kilometres, according to the US Geological Survey. This is just a few hundred kilometres from the site of a 7.6 magnitude earthquake that struck in October 2005, killing more than 75,000 people and displacing some 3.5 million more, although that earthquake was much shallower.
