On Sunday, a 6.3-magnitude earthquake hit western Afghanistan, causing widespread damage. Solid earthquakes and aftershocks in the same area had already killed thousands and demolished entire cities just a week before this.
According to the United States Geological Survey, the epicenter of the most recent quake was located about 21 miles outside of Herat, the province’s capital, and five miles below the surface.
Save the Children reports that four people have been killed, and 153 others have been injured and taken to the Herat Regional Hospital. Everything has been wiped out in the Baloch area of the Rabat Sangi district. Multiple communities have been destroyed, the humanitarian group reports. Authorities lowered their initial estimate of fatalities.
A 42-year-old citizen of Herat City, Sayed Kazim Rafiqi, said he had never seen such destruction, with “people terrified” and “most houses” destroyed. It was, he said, unlike anything he had ever seen. The hospital severely needed blood, so Rafiqi and a few others went there to donate.
He urged that we make “whatever contribution we can.”
Herat’s October 7 earthquakes were among the most destructive in recent Afghan history, destroying entire neighborhoods.
According to United Nations officials, more than 90% of those killed a week ago were women and children, they said on Thursday.
The Taliban claim that more than 2,000 people were killed in the region due to the prior earthquakes. Most casualties and destruction occurred in the Zenda Jan district, the earthquake’s epicenter.
Communities in the region’s arid hills were reduced to rubble and funerals after the destruction inflicted by that disaster. In many regions, the number of volunteers who came to sift the wreckage and make mass graves outnumbers the number of living individuals, and the survivors are having a hard time coming to terms with the deaths of multiple family members.
Hundreds of mud-brick homes were destroyed because they were not strong enough to withstand the original earthquake, its aftershocks, and a second earthquake measuring 6.3 on Wednesday. The hamlet’s public buildings, including schools and health centers, were destroyed.
