17 years to catastrophic earthquake of Oct 8 in Pakistan
2005 Kashmir Earthquake, a catastrophic earthquake that struck on October 8, 2005 in the Pakistan-administered region of Kashmir and the Northwest Border Province (NWFP; renamed Khyber Pakhtunkhwa after 2010) of Pakistan caused massive destruction. It also affected neighboring parts of India and Afghanistan.
At least 79,000 people were killed and more than 32,000 buildings collapsed in Kashmir, with even more deaths and destruction reported in India and Afghanistan, making it one of the most devastating earthquakes to date. The devastating earthquake struck at 8:50 local time (03:50 UTC), with its epicenter 19km northeast of Muzaffarabad, the administrative center of Pakistan-administered Azad Kashmir, and approximately 65 miles (105km) to northeast of Muzaffarabad) northeast of Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan.
Measured at a magnitude of 7.6 (slightly less than that of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake), the earthquake caused severe destruction in northern Pakistan, northern India and Afghanistan, an area that lies on an active fault caused from the tectonic drift towards the north of the subcontinent India. The area around Muzaffarabad was the hardest hit and several villages were completely destroyed. At least 32,335 buildings collapsed in several cities in the Kashmir region – including Anantnag and Srinagar in the state of Jammu and Kashmir (now a union territory), India – with further property losses reported in the Pakistani cities of Islamabad, Lahore and Gujrat. among the others.
The official death toll was 79,000 for Pakistan-administered Kashmir and the NWFP, although other sources put it at 86,000 and the number of injured is estimated at over 69,000. At least 1,350 people were killed and 6,266 injured in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, and the tremors were felt up to 620 miles (1,000 km), as far as Delhi and Punjab in northern India. Four deaths and 14 injuries were reported in Afghanistan.
The loss of property in the aftermath of the earthquake left around four million residents in the area homeless. The severity of the damage and the high number of casualties were exacerbated by poor construction in the affected areas. Relief efforts for survivors were hampered by numerous aftershocks and landslides and rockfalls that damaged highways and mountain roads and left parts of the affected region inaccessible for several days.
17 years to catastrophic earthquake of Oct 8 in Pakistan
In a show of goodwill, five border crossing points in the Line of Control (the military demarcation line between the Indian-administered parts of Kashmir and Pakistan) have been opened to facilitate rescue efforts and the flow of ‘assistance. Troops from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and various international aid organizations played an important role in the relief and rescue efforts that followed.
