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The earthquake struck late Friday evening, with the epicentre 75 kilometres west of Marrekesh, a major economic centre.
A powerful 6.8 magnitude earthquake has shocked Morocco, sending pulses from the city of Rabat in the north to Sidi Ifni in the south and beyond.
At least five people have died, according to the news station Al-Arabiya. Authorities have yet to confirm the death toll.
The United States Geological Survey (USGS) estimates that the epicentre of the quake occurred near the ski resort of Oukaïmedene in the Atlas Mountains, some 75 kilometres (44 miles) from Marrakesh, the fourth largest city in the country.
The earthquake took place shortly after 11pm local time (22:00 GMT) on Friday evening, according to the USGS.
The full scale of the devastation was not immediately known. But videos and images shared on social media showed clouds of dust and piles of rubble, as walls buckled under the force of the quake.
Other posts depicted shocked residents running for safety, out of local buildings and onto the street.
🇲🇦🏛️| Rénovée il ya 2 ans à peine, la kasbah d’Agadir Oufella commence déjà à tomber en ruines après le séisme de magnitude 7. pic.twitter.com/HgMkKW5oDo
— Morocco Intelligence (@MoroccoIntel) September 9, 2023
One Marrakesh resident, Brahim Himmi, told the Reuters news agency that he spotted ambulances leaving the city’s historic old town. He also said that building facades had been damaged as the earth shook.
“There’s not too much damage, more panic. We heard screams at the time of the tremor,” a resident of Essaouira told the news agency AFP. “People are in the squares, in the cafes, preferring to sleep outside.”
While earthquakes in the region are “uncommon but not unexpected”, one of this magnitude has not been seen in the region in over 120 years.
“Since 1900, there have been no earthquakes M6 [magnitude 6] or larger within 500 km of this earthquake, and only 9 M5 [magnitude 5] and larger,” the USGS said on its website.
Most of those previous earthquakes occurred further to the east as well, the agency added.
Friday evening’s earthquake was a relatively shallow one, occurring at a depth of 18.5 km (11.5 miles). The USGS explained that “oblique-reverse faulting” in the Atlas Mountains were the cause of the quake.
The last major earthquake to strike Morocco occurred in 2004, killing over 600 people. That quake, dubbed the Al Hoceima earthquake, was positioned on an active plate boundary on the country’s northernmost coast, bordering the western Mediterranean Sea. It clocked in at a magnitude of 6.3.
An even larger quake struck neighbouring Algeria in 1980. Known as the El Asnam earthquake, the 7.3-magnitude event was the strongest seismic activity the region had seen in centuries. Also originating in the Atlas Mountain range, it levelled houses, leaving 300,000 people on the street and over 2,600 people dead.
In the wake of Friday’s earthquake, the director of Morocco’s National Institute of Geophysics, Nacer Jabour, told the newspaper Le Matin that the possibility of aftershocks were slim.
🚨 URGENT
Les premières vidéos des dégâts du séisme commencent à être publiées ! 😥🇲🇦
— TFT MOROCCO (@TFT_Morocco) September 8, 2023
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Powerful 6.8-magnitude earthquake rattles Morocco, killing at least five - Al Jazeera English
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