An earthquake of magnitude 6.3 struck northwestern Afghanistan on October 11, the German Research Center for Geosciences (GFZ) said, claiming at least one life and causing panic among residents already traumatised by a series of tremors that killed around 2,000 people at the weekend.
The latest magnitude 6.3 earthquake was about 28 kilometers (17 miles) outside Herat, the capital of Herat province, and 10 kilometers (6 miles) deep, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
Wednesday’s quake has injured at least 80 people and a landslide has blocked the main Herat-Torghondi highway, Information Ministry spokesman Abdul Wahid Rayan said.
It also flattened all 700 homes in Chahak village, which was untouched by the tremors of previous days. There are mounds of soil where dwellings used to be. But there were no deaths initially reported in Chahak because people have taken shelter in tents this week, fearing for their lives as tremors continue to rock Herat.
Villagers are distraught over the loss of their homes and livestock, often their only possessions, and worry about the coming harsh winter months. Some said they had never seen an earthquake before and wondered when the shaking of the ground would stop.
Many said they have no peace of mind inside the tents for fears the “ground will open and swallow us at any moment.”
The epicenter of Saturday’s quake was about 40 kilometers (25 miles) northwest of the provincial capital, and several aftershocks have been strong, including another of magnitude 6.3 on Saturday.
Taliban officials said more than 2,000 had died across Herat after the earlier quakes. They subsequently said the quakes killed and injured thousands but didn’t give a breakdown of casualties.
Besides rubble and funerals after Saturday’s devastation, there is little left of the villages in the region’s dusty hills.
In Naib Rafi, a village that previously had about 2,500 residents, people said almost no one was still alive besides men who were working outside when the quake struck. Survivors worked all day with excavators to dig long trenches for mass burials.
On a barren field in the district of Zinda Jan, a bulldozer removed mounds of earth to clear space for a long row of graves.
“It is very difficult to find a family member from a destroyed house and a few minutes to later bury him or her in a nearby grave, again under the ground,” said Mir Agha, from the city of Herat, who had joined hundreds of volunteers to help the locals.
Nearly 2,000 houses in 20 villages were destroyed, the Taliban have said. The area hit by the quakes has just one government-run hospital.
On Tuesday, U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said Zinda Jan was the worst-affected area, with more than 1,300 people killed and nearly 500 people still reported missing.
He said U.N. satellite imagery also indicated extreme levels of destruction in the district of Injil.
“Our humanitarian colleagues warn that children are particularly vulnerable and have suffered severe psychological distress from the earthquake,” he said.
Neighboring Pakistan is among the countries that have offered assistance but the delivery of its humanitarian aid has been on hold since Monday.
On Wednesday morning, the pledged supplies had yet to leave Pakistan. Authorities were waiting for “clearance” from the Taliban, two government officials in Islamabad said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
Ties between the two countries have come under pressure since Pakistan announced a deadline for undocumented migrants, including 1.7 million Afghans living illegally in the country, to leave before Oct. 31 to avoid arrests and forced deportation.
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