A 6.9 magnitude quake in remote Papua New Guinea kills 3 and destroys nearly 1,000 homes
Port Moresby, Mar 25: A magnitude 6.9 earthquake has hit a remote part of western Papua New Guinea killing at least three people and causing extensive damage to around 1,000 homes, officials said.
The quake rocked the East Sepik region at about 6.20 am Sunday (2020 GMT Saturday) near the town of Ambunti, about 470 miles (756 kilometres) northwest of the capital of Port Moresby, and at a depth of 25 miles (about 40 kilometres), according to reports by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
East Sepik province Governor Allan Bird posted on Facebook Sunday that initial estimates show the earthquake had destroyed about 1,000 homes in the area which was already "dealing with widespread flooding" from earlier in March.
"The flooding actually covers an area more than 800 kilometres long, and so there's about maybe 60 or 70 villages involved all along the Sepik River," Bird told the ABC on Monday.
Local emergency crews were already active in the region because of the flooding when the earthquake struck.
"The floods weren't their biggest problem. They were confidently dealing with that because it's something they're used to," Bird said. "It was the earthquake that no one was prepared for. That would have caused the most significant damage now."
Bird said shelter, clean water, food and canvases to keep belongings dry were the most immediate pressing needs for the village communities.
Papua New Guinea, a South Pacific island nation located to the north of Australia, was hit with two earthquakes in April last year, including a magnitude 7.0 quake that killed four people in a remote northern part of the country.
A magnitude 7.6 quake that struck a remote area of the island in September 2022 was later found to have killed 21 people.
It is located on the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and sits on the Pacific "Ring of Fire," the arc of seismic faults around the Pacific Ocean where much of the world's earthquake and volcanic activity occurs.
In recent months, the island has also been beset by civil unrest with rioting in its two largest cities in January leaving 15 dead, before tribal violence killed at least 26 combatants and an unconfirmed number of bystanders last month.
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Siddaramaiah holds dharna protesting Centre's 'injustice' in release of drought relief to Karnataka
Bengaluru (PTI): Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, his deputy D K Shivakumar along with several ministers and legislators on Sunday staged a dharna here, alleging injustice done to the state by the union government while releasing the drought relief funds.
Holding 'Chombu', the round water pot symbolising emptiness and deception, the leaders charged the Centre with "cheating" Karnataka by not releasing adequate relief to face acute drought, the kind of which was not witnessed in the past several decades.
They held the symbolic dharna in front of the Mahatma Gandhi statue on the premises of "Vidhana Soudha", which houses the Legislature and Secretariat.
The state government has declared 226 out of the total 236 Taluks in Karnataka as drought-hit and said there was a crop loss in 48 lakh hectares of land.
According to Siddaramaiah, against the demand for Rs 18,171 crore for drought relief, the union government ordered release of only Rs 3,454 crore, that too after the state approached the Supreme Court.
The amount was not even a quarter of the state's demand, he noted.
#WATCH | Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah, Deputy CM DK Shivakumar, Congress MP and general secretary Randeep Singh Surjewala along with several other leaders stage a protest against the central government over the release of more funds for drought relief, at Mahatma Gandhi Statue in… pic.twitter.com/cppcWpkohm
— ANI (@ANI) April 28, 2024
