Over 153 killed as powerful quake strikes Myanmar, sows panic in Bangkok and Hanoi

BANGKOK – A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighbouring Thailand and Vietnam on March 28, killing over 153 people, toppling buildings and key bridges, and rupturing roads.

At least 144 people were killed and more than 700 injured in Myanmar, the state-run MRTV said on the Telegram messaging app.

“I have requested international support for relief efforts and have allowed some offers for support from AHA Centre (Asean disaster response organisation) and India,” the junta chief, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, said in a speech broadcasted by MRTV.

The 7.7-magnitude tremor hit north-west of the city of Sagaing at a shallow depth around lunchtime, the United States Geological Survey (USGS) said. A 6.4-magnitude aftershock hit the same area minutes later.

“We want the international community to give humanitarian aid as soon as possible,” junta spokesman Zaw Min Tun said at the hospital.

He said state-run hospitals in Naypyitaw, Mandalay and Sagaing were all packed with patients.

Earlier in the day, at least 20 people were confirmed dead at a 1,000-bed hospital in Naypyitaw.

The rare plea from the junta raises the prospect that damage and casualties may be on a large scale, with Myanmar’s medical system and infrastructure ravaged by four years of civil war.

A US government predictive analysis based on the strength and depth of the earthquake estimated there could be between 10,000 and 100,000 deaths and severe economic loss, with the Sagaing and Meiktila regions worst-hit.

“Overall, the population in this region resides in structures that are vulnerable to earthquake shaking, though resistant structures exist,” the analysis said.

“High casualties and extensive damage are probable, and the disaster is likely widespread,” it said.

In Mandalay, Myanmar’s second-largest city, bleeding victims were rushed to hospital by ambulance, car and motorbike.

Buildings were left in ruins, and a doctor at Mandalay General Hospital said so many people arrived for treatment that nurses ran out of cotton swabs and he had no place to stand.

At least three people were killed in Taungoo city, in Myanmar’s Bago region, when a mosque partially collapsed, witnesses said, while local media reported that two people died and 20 were injured after a hotel collapsed in Aung Ban town, in Shan state.

Ms Kyi Shwin, 45, said her three-year-old daughter was among those who died. They were having lunch in their house when the earthquake struck.

“As soon as it started, I ran downstairs, but I didn’t make it in time,” Ms Kyi Shwin said. “I tried to run to her, but before I could, bricks fell on me too.”

She was bleeding heavily as she spoke outside the hospital.

“There is no government to help us, not enough doctors to care for us,” she said. “I am going to die. I don’t want to die. Please help.”

In Bangkok, a 30-storey building under construction collapsed.

At least nine people were killed and dozens of workers rescued from under the rubble of the skyscraper, Thai Deputy Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai said.

Rescuers were seeking to free 81 more people still trapped in the building’s ruins.

The massive building intended for government offices was reduced to a tangle of rubble and twisted metal in seconds, footage shared on social media showed.

“When I arrived to inspect the site, I heard people calling for help, saying ‘help me’,” said Mr Worapat Sukthai, deputy police chief of Bang Sue district.

“We estimate that hundreds of people are injured, but we are still determining the number of casualties,” he said.

‘Mass casualty’

The Yangon Times reported that the air traffic control tower at the airport in Naypyitaw collapsed, killing everyone inside.

Several ministry buildings in Naypyitaw, including those housing the Foreign Ministry and the Ministry of Labour, likewise collapsed, killing many, including the permanent secretary of the Ministry of Labour, according to the newspaper.

A team of journalists was at the National Museum in Naypyitaw when the earthquake struck. Pieces fell from the ceiling as the building began shaking. Uniformed staff ran outside, some trembling and tearful, others grabbing cellphones to try to contact loved ones.

Roads nearby were buckled and broken by the tremors, and the route to one of the city’s biggest hospitals was jammed with traffic.

The hospital was a “mass casualty area” after the quake, officials said.

An ambulance made its way between vehicles, with a paramedic shouting “cars, move aside so the ambulance can get through”.

At the hospital, the wounded were being treated in the street outside, intravenous drips hanging from their gurneys.

Some writhed in pain, while others lay still as relatives sought to comfort them.

As night fell, journalists saw rescuers trying to extract a mother and son from the ruins of a collapsed building in Naypyitaw.

Both were seriously injured, but rescuers were unable to reach them, a Red Cross worker told AFP.

Panic far and wide

The tremors sent people across Myanmar and Thailand into the streets.

“I heard it, and I was sleeping in the house, I ran as far as I could in my pyjamas out of the building,” said Mr Duangjai, a resident of the popular northern Thailand tourist city of Chiang Mai.

Social media posts from Mandalay showed collapsed buildings and debris strewn across the city’s streets.

One witness in the city told Reuters: “We all ran out of the house as everything started shaking. I witnessed a five-storey building collapse in front of my eyes. Everyone in my town is out on the road and no one dares to go back inside buildings.”

Mr Sai, a 76-year-old Chiang Mai resident, was working at a minimart when the shop started to shake.

“I quickly rushed out of the shop along with other customers,” he said.

“This is the strongest tremor I have experienced in my life.”

The quake forced the suspension of some metro and light rail services in Bangkok, where Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra was reported to have declared a state of emergency.

In Hanoi, Vietnam, hundreds of people rushed out of high-rise buildings after feeling the tremors.

“The chandeliers were swinging strongly,” said Ms Vy Nguyen, who works in an office building in central Ho Chi Minh City. She said it sounded as though the windows were cracking.

“One of my guests crawled under the table, while I remained standing. I am still feeling dizzy now,” she said.

Tremors were also felt in Penang, Malaysia.

“I was in the middle of typing an article when I unexpectedly experienced vertigo. At first, I thought I was feeling dizzy as it only lasted a few seconds, so I continued working,” said Buletin Mutiara writer M. Thanushalini, 38.

“It was only later, after learning about the earthquake, that I connected the dots,” she said.

Penang Economic Planning Unit assistant secretary Zeulqarnain Wahid, 33, said she also felt her building swaying.

“The Hari Raya decorative lights in our office began to sway, and I felt light-headed. Several colleagues also mentioned feeling the same, and we realised it was unusual,” she said.

Seismic waves reached as far as China, Cambodia, Bangladesh and India.

A live-stream broadcast by the state-linked Beijing News showed around a dozen emergency workers in orange jumpsuits and helmets on a street strewn with fallen masonry in the city of Ruili, at the Chinese border with Myanmar.

A shop worker interviewed on the live stream showed phone footage of people running out of stores with their hands over their heads as tremors swept through the street.

A video posted on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, showed a torrent of water and debris cascading from the roof of a high-rise block in Ruili as people fled through a street market below.

Earthquakes are relatively common in Myanmar, where six strong quakes of 7 magnitude or more struck between 1930 and 1956 near the Sagaing Fault, which runs north to south through the centre of the country, according to the USGS.

A powerful 6.8-magnitude earthquake in the ancient capital Bagan in central Myanmar killed three people in 2016, also toppling spires and crumbling temple walls at the tourist destination.

The breakneck pace of development in Myanmar’s cities, combined with crumbling infrastructure and poor urban planning, has also made the country’s most populous areas vulnerable to earthquakes and other disasters, experts say.

The impoverished South-east Asian nation has a strained medical system, especially in its rural states. AFP, REUTERS, BLOOMBERG