A 6.0-magnitude quake struck Kunar and Nangahar provinces in Afghanistan, leaving many thousands injured
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A 6.0-magnitude earthquake struck the Afghanistan provinces of Kunar and Nangahar late last night. Only eight kilometres deep – and therefore causing greater destruction – the quake was felt more than 135 kilometres away in the capital, Kabul, as well as Pakistan. Several villages in the region have been entirely destroyed.
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The first quake was followed by at least nine aftershocks, which are believed to have caused further deaths. According to director of the seismology centre in Pakistan, Najib Ahmad Amir, aftershocks could continue for up to two days.
The exact scale of destruction is difficult to gauge due to the remoteness and inaccessibility of affected areas. However, the Mazar Valley area appears to be the ‘epicentre’ with one village ‘completely destroyed,’ according to national director of World Vision Afghanistan Thamindri de Silva.
Already, aid is being delivered to impacted areas. The UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) said its staff are on the ground working to get food to those in need. In addition, the Defence Ministry has flown 30 doctors and 800 kilograms of medicine into Kunar to support hospitals receiving an influx of casualties.
Rescue efforts to recover individuals trapped underneath rubble are continuing, although these plans are hampered by road blockages caused by rubble from the quake, along with the steep terrain of the region.
In particular, Kunar is a poor mountainous region with homes constructed mostly of mud and rocks.
Is Afghanistan prone to earthquakes?
Afghanistan is located in a tectonically-active part of the world, on the edge of the Eurasian tectonic plate. It is bordered by the northern boundary of the Indian plate and with the Arabian plate into the south.
Earthquakes cause the most fatalities in Afghanistan out of any natural disaster – with almost 2.7 million deaths recorded from the natural disasters since 1900 – and can often lead to landslides in more mountainous regions.
In October 2023, three earthquakes hit Afghanistan in the space of just eight days, all ranging between 6.3 and 6.4-magnitude in the Herat, Badghis and Farah provinces. Nearly 1,500 people were killed in Herat and the surrounding districts. In the three most affected areas, almost 150,000 people lost their homes, or faced severe damage to them.
The quakes also caused entire villages to be flattened, and six schools were destroyed alongside two community education centres in the affected areas. Buildings in the nation tend to made of timber, weak concrete or mud brick – all of which are not quake-resistant.
Plans to strengthen the country’s defences against earthquakes include retrofitting existing buildings to prevent building collapse. In particular, ensuring schools have adequate infrastructure would reduce potential economic losses by 60 per cent, and reduce fatalities by 90 per cent.
