Next Mozambican Earthquake "Could Cause Damage" - Minister
Posted on: Thursday, 23 February 2006, 12:00 CST
Excerpt from report by Portuguese TV on 23 February
[Announcer] At least two are dead and 18 people have been injured by a earthquake which hit Mozambique early this morning. It measured 7.5 on the Richter scale and the epicentre was in the province of Manica in the centre of the country.
[Reporter] General panic and people in the street. Two dead, including one child, 17 people with light injuries and one person seriously injured. This is the aftermath of the earthquake that hit Mozambique just after midnight.
With the epicentre in Espungabera, in the province of Manica, in the centre of the country, it measured 7.5 on the Richter scale, an almost unheard-of phenomenon in a country with no ability to predict or prepare for it. [Passage omitted.]
The council of ministers has already analysed the size of the problem. The material damage was insignificant. But Espungabera's propensity for earth tremors already makes one think of the need to evacuate the town in the medium term. The authorities will try to convince the few inhabitants of Espungabera of the danger they are in.
[Minister of Mineral Resources, Esperanca Bias] There is a need to explain that today there was no damage but the next earthquake, which we do not know when it will happen, could cause damage and one of the ways to avoid damage is to take a series of precautions.
[Reporter] The Institute for Disaster Management now has two weeks to present the government with an action plan which includes help for the injured. After the scare, life has returned to normal.
The hours of panic have gone but the day that the earth again shook in Mozambique will go into history. Because in the end, in the 50s another earthquake had been recorded with the same epicentre, but on a lower scale to the one recorded early this morning.
Source: BBC Monitoring European
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