Earthquake in Greece: earthquake of magnitude 6.1 in Crete
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September 28, 2021 Aftershocks were recorded in Crete in the aftermath of a major earthquake that killed one person, damaged a thousand buildings and left many homeless.
The strongest aftershock with magnitude 5.3 occurred at 7.48 (04:48 Gmt), just as Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis is preparing for a mission on the largest island in Greece.
The epicenter of yesterday's earthquake was near the town of Arkalochori, where a worker was killed inside a collapsed church where he was working and a dozen people were injured in the same place.
The earthquake, according to the Athens Geodynamic Observatory, occurred at 09:17 with the epicenter (10 kilometers deep) located 23 kilometers from Heraklion, the capital of the island. The city that has suffered the most damage, however, especially the collapses of old buildings, is the agricultural center of Arkolohori. "It is an earthquake that we did not expect. So far there have been aftershocks in the area equal to a magnitude of about 4.5" , seismologist Efthymis Lekkas, president of the earthquake protection agency, told the Greek news agency ANA.
"It was a very difficult night, we had a lot of aftershocks ... We were up all night," Chryssoula Kegeroglou, the town's mayor, told ERT state radio.
Authorities have set up several tents to house hundreds of people whose homes have been deemed uninhabitable and have also made dozens of hotel rooms available.
Kegeroglou said about a thousand people spent the night in tents.