Fatal earthquake strikes popular Italian tourist spot

  • 22/08/2017

One person has been killed and at least 20 injured after an earthquake measuring 4.0-magnitude hit the Italian resort island of Ischia, off the coast of Naples, with a number of building collapsing.

Residents and tourists on the island, which is crowded at the height of the summer season, ran out on to the streets from homes and hospitals after the quake on Monday night.

Television images showed that about six buildings in the town of Casamicciola as well as a church had collapsed in the quake, which hit just before 9pm.

Italy's National Institute of Geophysics and Vulcanology (INGV) put the magnitude at 4.0 but both the US Geological Survey (USGS) and the European quake agency, EMSC, estimated the magnitude at 4.3.

Local Civil Protection Department official Giovanni Vittozzi said one woman was killed when she was hit by falling masonry from a church, and that officials were checking reports of another victim.

Helicopters and a ferry boat were bringing in more rescue workers from the mainland.

Roberto Allocca, a doctor from a local hospital, told Sky TG24 television that about 25 people had been treated for minor injuries. Most of the hospital had been evacuated and the injured were being treated outside.

Some civil protection squads were already on the island because of brushfires.

The television reports said the buildings that collapsed appeared to have been inhabited and about 10 people were still unaccounted for.

The quake hit a few days before the first anniversary of a major quake that killed nearly 300 people in central Italy, most of them in the town of Amatrice.

Reuters