Friday, July 16, 2010

Moderate quakes strike Mandalay

 
Friday, 16 July 2010 19:05 Myo Thein

Rangoon (Mizzima) - Two earthquakes, which witnesses described more by sound than shakes, struck in quick succession at 1:55 p.m. today near Mandalay, the economic hub of Upper Burma, local residents and Burmese seismic officials said.

“We heard a loud noise like a roll of thunder so we felt nervous and went outside to check out what’d happened. Then we sensed quite clearly that the earth was shaking”, a woman from Aungmyaythazan Township told Mizzima.

The quakes gave off vertical tremors and were not severe. People could only sense them because of their booming noise, local residents said.

“They are just minor earthquakes and we were only aware of them because of the loud sounds. They lasted just a few seconds and a few seconds after the first one stopped, the second one started,” a journalist from Mandalay said. “Many people left their homes and went outside … in response to the quakes,”

An official in charge of Burma’s Department of Meteorology and Hydrology said: “The 4.5-magnitude earthquakes were centred 25 miles (40 kilometres) west of Mandalay and started at 1:54:36 p.m.”