Increasingly desperate attempts are
still underway to pull out those trapped
beneath their collapsed homes after the
earthquake struck in eastern Afghanistan
late last night.
The Afghan National Disaster Agency has
provided medical teams enabling some of
the badly injured to be airlifted to
hospital. It's a mountainous area badly
served by road and landslides caused by
the quake are making communications even
more difficult.
>> The greatest need now though, more
manpower to find those still underneath
the rubble.
>> Almost the entire village has collapsed.
The earthquake struck at midnight.
Children are trapped under the rubble.
The elderly are trapped under the
rubble. Young people are under the
rubble. We need help here.
The epicenter appears to have been just
outside the city of Jalalabad in the
eastern part of the country. The
provinces of Nangaha and Kuna are the
worst affected. Tremors were felt 140
kilometers away in the capital Carbal
and also over the border into
neighboring Pakistan.
Buildings in rural areas of Afghanistan
are usually low-rise and constructed
from mud bricks and wood with
foundations unlikely to withstand
earthquakes of this magnitude.
[Music]
Nearly 95% of our houses are destroyed.
We have many martyed and wounded people.
Almost every family has five to 10
wounded. Muslims who are listening, help
us for the sake of Allah.
Afghanistan has suffered two other
serious earthquakes in the last three
years. Around a thousand people died in
Pakika province in 2022 with a similar
number left dead in Herat province the
following year. Geologists say this part
of Afghanistan is an area of very high
seismic activity, a so-called collision
zone which can show the effects of India
moving towards Eurasia at around 4 and a
half cm every year.
Aid agencies are poised to help, but the
Taliban government was limiting access
to the areas affected this morning.
There are doubts that funds and
resources exist in the country to carry
out a full rescue operation.
The problems are many. The Red Cross
cannot handle the situation. We urge the
ministries of defense and interior to
pay close attention and transport
doctors and medicine to the injured.
>> The latest estimate from this disaster
is that 800 people have lost their
lives. Two and a half thousand are
injured, many seriously.
Entire villages are destroyed with
survivors left homeless. The rescue and
relief operation looks set to last for
days now. Full recovery from the scars
of an event like this likely to be a
lifetime.
Well, I'm now joined by Theindri D Silva
from World Vision Afghanistan who's
currently in Carbal around a 100
kilometers away from the affected area.
So, you felt the earthquake just how
severe was it?
>> It was a magnitude six, but because the
the it was a very shallow sort of tremor
at a shallow level, it it led to a lot
of destruction, particularly in terms of
homes because a lot of that area is it's
some of the most poorest uh parts of
Afghanistan and a lot of the houses are
built with just mud and a little bit of
timber. they don't have any structural
reinforcements which means that as soon
as there's a tremor everything gets just
crushed and and and people are just sort
of enveloped in in in in sand and ash.
Um it's a it's a very very sad
situation.
>> What's the area look like now?
>> It's been very hard because a lot of the
the responses that that that started it
this morning was was from either either
by helicopter or there were aerial
surveys. Um now the roads have finally
been open. there were several landslides
which had blocked off any sort of road
access and there are barely any roads
anyway. Uh but now people are able to go
and uh I understand that a joint
assessment is underway by several um
international and national agencies as
well as the authorities. So uh right now
we are seeing a lot of casualties and
the death toll is rising as well as the
numbers injured. We initially thought
that it was just Kuna which was at the
epicenter but we're also finding out
that there are the the surrounding
provinces of Lagman and Nuristan have
also been uh affected as well as
Jalalabad.
>> So what are your aid partners on the
ground actually reporting back?
>> So at the moment it it is it is very
unclear. Um we world vision worked with
the Herat earthquake in 2023 and what I
assume is people are going to be
desperate for food for shelter uh and
for also a loss of livelihood. If there
have been human casualties that means a
lot of the livestock would have been
lost as well which means that there's
there's a lot of economic recovery that
needs to happen in the area as well.
>> Understand the organization you're
working with on the ground there is led
by women. Is that accepted by the
Taliban government?
>> In the past three to four, three years,
three to four years, uh in emergency
situations, women have been allowed to
work particularly in order to uh to
reach those affected uh women affected
by the by the disaster in this case an
earthquake. I'm assuming that in this
situation as well, uh permissions will
be given so that uh at least during the
first phase that it will be easy for
women to access the field.
>> So what are the priorities on the ground
now?
Right now, the priorities would be first
and foremost within this 24-hour window
to try to get as many survivors out of
the rubble as possible. Uh it is going
to be very hard for large heavy heavy
vehicles and machinery to get through uh
because the terrain is so hilly. Uh but
I think the a lot of a lot a lot of it
is depends on human power and manpower.
So we need to make sure that the at
least you know shovels and other types
of tools are available so that people
can start digging out. They would need
people as well because if many of the
people have been affected in the area
they would still be in shock and still
trying to recover. One of my key
concerns and something World Vision
learned as part of the Herat earthquake
is the mental health that goes with an
earthquakes especially if you haven't
faced this kind of a situation before
particularly for children but also for
men and women. What we saw earlier was
that uh as soon as the event occurred,
the children and the women were the
first, but as time went by, the men
started showing greater sort of mental
health issues because uh they kind of
relive the the trauma
>> and more immediately so many people
injured, aren't there? Are there
sufficient resources in the hospitals to
actually cope with them? So there aren't
really a lot of not even basic health
clinics in that area which means that a
lot of people have been airlifted to the
major hospitals which are mainly in
Jalalabad the rest of Nangaha and then
also to Kabul. Uh we don't have enough
resources. Afghanistan in general does
not have any many large tertiary care
sort of facilities. Even the basic
health care facilities are a lot less
particularly after the funding cuts of
earlier this year. We've already seen a
closure of 400 plus basic health
centers. There are medical teams on
standby. There have been medical teams
that have been allocated to support, but
it's definitely not going to be enough
uh for the scale that we are seeing uh
unfold.
>> Do you predict that the death toll will
get worse as the day goes on?
Yeah, initially we had thought that the
the total figure might be 600 to 800
across the provinces but now Kunar alone
is is is projecting 800 uh per people
dead. So that is it is definitely going
to increase. That's what we are being
told.
>> How long do you think it'll take for the
area to recover fully?
>> I I really can't tell. It's two years
since the Hat earthquake and we are
still seeing people living in tents not
having access to health care or
livelihood or even water and sanitation
facilities given that this area is even
more remote than that area of HAD that
was impacted you we cannot tell and with
the aid cuts and with the dep
prioritization in many ways it's going
to be a very long time um unless people
start migrating moving into more urban
areas it's going to be a long time
before any of this any sort of real
relief is restored and real development
is given to the areas.
>> Thank you so much for joining us. Much
appreciated.
>> Thank you.