The 2008 Kyrgyzstan earthquake struck on October 5 at 21:52 local time (15:52 UTC) with a

moment magnitude The moment magnitude scale (MMS; denoted explicitly with or Mw, and generally implied with use of a single M for magnitude) is a measure of an earthquake's magnitude ("size" or strength) based on its seismic moment. It was defined in a 1979 pape ...

of 6.6, killing 75 people, including 41 children, and injuring 150 people, including 93 children. The center of the

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, fr ...

was near the town of Nura, which was destroyed in the quake. The shock destroyed dozens of buildings in the area and destroyed the nearby village of Kura. Minor damage also occurred in nearby

Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region Xinjiang, SASM/GNC: ''Xinjang''; zh, c=, p=Xīnjiāng; formerly romanized as Sinkiang (, ), officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China (PRC), located in the northwest ...

. The quake was felt throughout

Central Asia Central Asia, also known as Middle Asia, is a subregion, region of Asia that stretches from the Caspian Sea in the west to western China and Mongolia in the east, and from Afghanistan and Iran in the south to Russia in the north. It includes t ...

. A magnitude 5.7 aftershock in Xinjiang and a magnitude 5.1 aftershock in Kyrgyzstan followed the earthquake. Two more aftershocks above magnitude 5 in Kyrgyzstan and one in Xinjiang struck on October 13, UTC time. Victims were transported in military

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

s to hospitals in

Osh Osh (Kyrgyz: Ош, romanised Osh; uz, O‘sh/Ўш) is the second-largest city in Kyrgyzstan, located in the Fergana Valley in the south of the country and often referred to as the "capital of the south". It is the oldest city in the country (e ...

. The Kyrgyzstan Emergency Ministry said that few buildings remained standing in the village: "Almost all buildings in the village have been destroyed. The only buildings remaining are the properly engineered ones which were built recently: the

school A school is an educational institution designed to provide learning spaces and learning environments for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is sometimes comp ...

and a medical clinic." Kanatbek Abdrakhmatov, head of the Institute of Seismology, attributed much of the destruction due to inferior construction of the buildings, many of which were built out of clay and straw. The injured were paid 5,000

Kyrgyzstani som The som (Kyrgyz: сом; ISO code: KGS; sign: с) is the currency of Kyrgyzstan. Etymology The official name of the Soviet currency in Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Tajik, and Uzbek was ''soum'', and this name appeared written on the back of banknotes ...

s (

US$ The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...

136) and 3 tons of

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when ...

, and families of the dead received 50 kg of flour. 200 people wish to remain in Nura, and were provided with 100 6-person tents. 100 mobile homes are being transported to Nura, and the village will be rebuilt in the spring of 2009, and should be completed by August 2009.

Uzbekistan Uzbekistan (, ; uz, Ozbekiston, italic=yes / , ; russian: Узбекистан), officially the Republic of Uzbekistan ( uz, Ozbekiston Respublikasi, italic=yes / ; russian: Республика Узбекистан), is a doubly landlocked co ...

pledged the equivalent of US$200,000 in humanitarian aid, including 120 tons of

cement A cement is a binder, a chemical substance used for construction that sets, hardens, and adheres to other materials to bind them together. Cement is seldom used on its own, but rather to bind sand and gravel ( aggregate) together. Cement mi ...

, as well as other building materials. In Kyrgyzstan, an official day of mourning was observed on October 7, 2008.

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* {{DEFAULTSORT:2008 Kyrgyzstan Earthquake

Kyrgyzstan Kyrgyzstan,, pronounced or the Kyrgyz Republic, is a landlocked country in Central Asia. Kyrgyzstan is bordered by Kazakhstan to the north, Uzbekistan to the west, Tajikistan to the south, and the People's Republic of China to the ea ...

Earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, fr ...

Earthquakes in Kyrgyzstan 2008 earthquake October 2008 events in Asia

See also

References

External links