A powerful earthquake shook the southern Philippines on Tuesday, October 29, 2019, triggering landslides and loosening boulders that killed six people and injured more than 100 others.
The same region was already damaged by a strong M6.3 quake two weeks ago.
The M6.6 earthquake was caused by the movement of a fault about 7 kilometers (4.3 miles) deep about 25 kilometers (16 miles) east of Tulunan in Cotabato province.
About 90% of the houses in three rural villages were damaged by the intense ground movement.
An earthquake of magnitude 6.6 sent people scrambling as it shook buildings and disrupted power supply on the Philippines island of Mindanao, killing at least two and injuring dozens https://t.co/RtCm3XomWI pic.twitter.com/uCDg0eX2Ti
— Reuters (@Reuters) October 29, 2019
Among the dead were a father and his child who were hit by boulders which rolled down a mountain onto their small farm in hard-hit North Cotabato province. Another child was injured, while more than 100 villagers received injuries, mostly minor, in the province.
Two others died in a landslide and falling debris in Magsaysay town in Davao del Sur province. A pregnant woman was killed by a falling tree in Tulunan and a 66-year-old man died from head injuries after apparently being hit by heavy debris in South Cotabato province’s capital, Koronadal, where 30 other people were injured as they dashed out of their homes, offices and shopping malls, police and other officials said.
The @philredcross is responding in full force to the 6.6 magnitude earthquake that happened in Tulunan, Cotabato Philippines. pic.twitter.com/I1N1txaH1k
— IFRC Intl. Federation #RedCross #RedCrescent (@ifrc) October 29, 2019
Several cities and towns suspended classes to allow inspections of school buildings. Several buildings damaged in another quake earlier this month sustained further damage and were closed to the public.
#Update At least 2 killed and hundreds reportedly injured after M6.6 #earthquake rocks Mindanao, south Philippines
— CGTN (@CGTNOfficial) October 29, 2019
latest: https://t.co/BkSYEOFXaU pic.twitter.com/JuZ2ywYsHu
A M6.3 earthquake on October 16 left at least seven people dead and more than 200 others injured and destroyed or damaged more than 7,000 buildings.
6.6 magnitude earthquake in #Philippines kills 1, injures dozens
— RT (@RT_com) October 29, 2019
READ MORE: https://t.co/d7IwL6o36M pic.twitter.com/ejKgoag4pt
In July, two earthquakes hours apart struck a group of sparsely populated islands in the Luzon Strait in the northern Philippines, killing eight people.
A magnitude 7.7 quake killed nearly 2,000 people in the northern Philippines in 1990.
The Philippines lies in the Pacific “Ring of Fire,” an arc of faults around the Pacific Ocean where most of the world’s earthquakes occur. So always be prepared for the next ‘Big One’. [USGS, Yahoo]
