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A powerful earthquake shook large swathes of the northern Philippines, injuring at least 26 people and forcing the closure of an international airport and the evacuation of patients from hospitals, officials said Wednesday.
The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology said Tuesday night’s 6.4-magnitude quake was triggered by the movement of a local fault and was centered 9 kilometers (5 miles) northwest of Lagayan town in Abra province at a depth of 11 kilometers (7 miles).
The U.S. Tsunami Warning System said no warnings or advisories were issued.
The quake was felt across a wide area of key northern Luzon, including parts of Metro Manila, more than 400 kilometers (248 miles) south of Abra.
At least 26 people were injured in Ilocos Norte, the hometown of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., at the international airport in Laoag, the provincial capital, due to damage from the earthquake, police and civil aviation officials said. It was ordered to temporarily close on Wednesday.
In the city of Batak, in Ilocos Norte province, patients were transferred out of the province’s largest hospital as the building shook and part of the ceiling of the intensive care unit collapsed. Officials said medical consultation services were temporarily suspended as engineers assessed the damage to the building.
In Manila, Marcos said authorities were inspecting roads and buildings and welfare officials were assisting affected residents in the northern province. “Everyone is advised to stay away from tall buildings,” the president tweeted.
In the town of La Paz in Abra, a century-old Christian church was vandalized, with several minute buildings toppling, cracks in some walls and debris littering the church’s grassy yard, officials said.
At least two towns in Cagayan province were temporarily without power due to damaged power lines. Many bridges and roads in outlying provinces were damaged.
In July, a magnitude-7 earthquake triggered landslides and damaged buildings in Abra and other northern provinces, killing at least five people and injuring dozens more.
In 1990, a 7.7-magnitude earthquake killed nearly 2,000 people in the northern Philippines and caused widespread damage, including the capital Manila.
The Philippine archipelago sits on the “Pacific Ring of Fire,” an area that spans much of the Pacific coast and is prone to frequent volcanic eruptions and earthquakes, making the Southeast Asian country one of the most disaster-prone countries in the world.
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