Croatia earthquake: Child killed as rescuers search rubble in Petrinja
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake has struck central Croatia, with reports of many injuries and at least one death.
A 12-year-old girl was killed in Petrinja, the prime minister said as he visited the town.
Further deaths have been reported by local media in a village to the south-west of Petrinja, but are yet to be confirmed.
The mayor of Petrinja said around half the town had been destroyed and people were being pulled from the rubble.
The earthquake could be felt in the Croatian capital Zagreb, in neighbouring Bosnia and Serbia, and as far away as Italy.
One woman was pulled alive from the rubble of the town hall, Croatian media reported.
“We are pulling people from the cars, we don’t know if we have dead or injured,” Darinko Dumbovic, the mayor of Petrinja, told regional broadcaster N1. “There is general panic, people are looking for their loved ones.”
The mayor was speaking to reporters on Tuesday when Petrinja, home to 20,000 people, was hit by another, weaker, tremor.
Pogledajte trenutak kada se zatresla #Petrinja pic.twitter.com/bZQxtGpU3f
— TV N1 Sarajevo (@N1infoSA) December 29, 2020
People were also injured in the nearby town of Sisak. National broadcaster HRT said the local hospital there was struggling to cope with the number of casualties arriving for treatment.
Tomislav Fabijanic, head of emergency medical services in Sisak, said they were seeing fractures, concussions and some people had needed surgery.
The GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences reported that the earthquake struck at 11:19 GMT at a depth of 10km (6 miles). The second tremor followed an hour or so later.
The Croatian Mountain Rescue Service said that rescuers from across Croatia had travelled to Petrinja to help with the search and recovery effort.
Our colleagues from Croatian Red Cross are on the ground assisting at the epicentre of the #earthquake at #Petrinja #croatia @crvenikriz_hr pic.twitter.com/tEJ58O8eab
— IFRC Europe (@IFRC_Europe) December 29, 2020
Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic, who rushed to Petrinja, said: “We have information that one girl was killed. We have no other information on casualties.”
“The army is here to help. We will have to move some people from Petrinja because it is unsafe to be here,” he added.
Bitter blow for struggling town
Croatia’s president and prime minister saw for themselves the scale of damage in Petrinja within two hours of the earthquake and were united in their response.
President Zoran Milanovic compared the scene to Grozny, the capital of the the Russian republic of Chechnya, which was largely destroyed during a siege 20 years ago. The prime minister said it was “clear as day” that Petrinja was no longer safe for human habitation.
It is a bitter blow for the town’s people, who faced a significant rebuilding operation after Croatia’s war of independence in the 1990s. More recently, they have been tackling economic devastation, with the decline of traditional industries.
Croatia’s leaders have promised funds for reconstruction. But Petrinja’s residents will be seeing in the new year in temporary accommodation – with little prospect of an early return home.
A kindergarten also collapsed in Petrinja, but it was empty at the time of the quake. In a village just outside Petrinja, a worker told N1 that nine of its 10 houses were destroyed.
Slovenia has moved to close the Krsko nuclear power plant it co-owns with Croatia.
The US Geological Survey said it was the largest earthquake to occur in Croatia since the introduction of modern seismic instrumentation. An earthquake of similar size occurred in 1880 near Zagreb.
A magnitude 5.2 earthquake hit central Croatia on Monday and there are fears of more.
Branko Dragicevic of the Serbian seismological institute told the BBC: “We can expect further quakes.”