A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck central Italy early Wednesday, with reports of damaged buildings, buried residents and blackouts near the epicentre Rieti, and badly damaging the town of Amatrice.
“The roads in and out of town are cut off. Half the town is gone,” Sergio Pirozzi, mayor of Amatrice, told RAI state television. “There are people under the rubble … There’s been a landslide and a bridge might collapse.”
He said the town “isn’t here anymore.”
The quake struck just after 3:30 a.m. local time and was felt across a broad section of central Italy, including the capital Rome where people in homes in the historic centre felt a long swaying followed by aftershocks.
The European Mediterranean Seismological Center put the magnitude at 6.1 and said the epicentre was northeast of Rome, near Rieti. The U.S. Geological Survey put the magnitude at 6.2.
Perozzi said there were downed buildings in the city centre and that the lights had gone out. He said he was unable to get in touch with emergency responders or reach the hospital.
“What can I tell you? It’s a drama,” he said.
In 2009, a 6.3-magnitude earthquake struck in the same region and killed more than 300 people. The earlier earthquake struck L’Aquila in central Italy, about 90 kilometres south of the latest quake.