At least 25 people were injured and several structures were damaged after a 6.0 magnitude earthquake struck the Ancash region, north of Lima, Peru on Saturday evening (27), authorities and local press reported this Sunday (28).
The earthquake occurred Saturday at 9:51 p.m. (11:51 p.m. Brasilia time) at a depth of 52 kilometers, with its epicenter in the Pacific Ocean, opposite the port city of Chimbote, according to the official bulletin.
The quake left “25 injured, including 12 hospitalized and 13 discharged,” the Ministry of Health said in a press release.
This Sunday, the local press broadcast images of the material impact of the earthquake.
In Chimbote, a town of 500,000 inhabitants located about 450 kilometers north of Lima, the main hospital suffered damage, as did schools and homes.
In videos circulating on social networks it is also possible to see cracked properties and supermarkets with goods on the ground.
The Geophysical Institute of Peru (IGP) reported on social networks that it had recorded several earthquakes in the country since Thursday, including one of magnitude 4.8 on Sunday 155 kilometers south of Lima.
The Institute of Geology, Mining and Metallurgy also indicated that it had “identified critical areas due to geological risks” in Áncash and La Libertad, another department further north.
Peru, with 34 million people, is located in the Pacific Ring of Fire, which stretches along the west coast of the Americas and eastern Asia.
These regions experience the greatest seismic activity in the world. In Peru alone, at least a hundred seismic tremors perceptible by the population occur each year.
In 1970, Peru suffered one of the deadliest earthquakes in the last hundred years, in which 67,000 people died in Áncash.
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