An earthquake rattled the Italian resort island of Ischia at the peak of tourist season Monday night, killing at least one person and trapping a half dozen others, including children, under collapsed homes.
Police said all but one of the people known to be trapped were responding to rescuers and were expected to be extracted alive. One person, however, wasn’t responding, raising worries the death toll could increase, said Giovanni Salerno of the financial police.
Italy’s national volcanology institute said the temblor struck a few minutes before 9 pm, just as many people were having dinner. The hardest-hit area was Casamicciola, on the northern part of the island.
There was great discrepancy in the magnitude reported: Italy’s national vulcanology agency put the initial magnitude at 3.6, though it revised it to a 4.0 sustained magnitude with a shallow depth of 5 kilometers (3 miles) in the waters just off the island. The US Geological Survey and the European-Mediterranean Seismological Center gave it a 4.3 magnitude, with a depth of 10 kilometers (6 miles).
While such discrepancies and revisions are common, Italian officials complained that the Italian agency’s initial low 3.6-magnitude greatly underestimated the power of the temblor.
At least one hotel and parts of a hospital were evacuated. A doctor at the Rizzoli hospital, Roberto Allocca, told Sky TG24 that some 26 people were being treated for minor injuries at a makeshift emergency room set up on the hospital grounds. He said the situation was calm and under control.
