Residential buildings have been destroyed and several villages have been deprived of electricity. Located on the edge of several tectonic plates, Iran is a zone of strong seismic activity.
Le Monde with AFP
Several earthquakes hit the south of Iran on Saturday July 2. The first occurred around 2 a.m. (local time, 11:30 p.m. Friday, Paris time) with a magnitude of 6 at a depth of 16 km, according to the American Sismological Institute (USGS). It was followed by two replicas, one of magnitude 5.7 and the other of magnitude 6.
The still provisional assessment reports five dead. According to state television, 49 people have also been injured. 2>
Almost finished rescue operations
The shock has occurred in an area located 100 kilometers south-west of the port of Bandar-E Abbas, according to the American Seismological Institute (USGS) . According to television images, several residential buildings of Sayeh Khosh – the most affected village – collapsed and the city was plunged into darkness due to a power failure. Electricity has been cut in nearly thirty villages located in the affected areas.
In Bandar-E Abbas, capital of the Hormozgan province, where half a million inhabitants live, the inhabitants spent the night in the street after the earthquake and long queues were formed before the Service stations.
“We focus on the reception of the victims of the earthquake,” said the governor of the province, Mehdi Dousti, said that 50 % of the village of Sayeh Khosh had been destroyed. Research and rescue operations are almost finished, announced the country’s red crescent, quoted by television.
area with high seismic activity
A person had already been killed in November 2021 in this Hormozgan province, struck by earthquakes of magnitude 6.4 and 6.3.
Located on the edge of several tectonic plates, Iran is an area of high seismic activity. In 2003, an earthquake of magnitude 6.6 partially destroyed the city of Bam (southeast) and killed at least 31,000 people. The deadliest earthquake in Iran remains that of magnitude 7.4, which occurred in 1990 in the north of the country: it had made 40,000 victims.