NEW DELHI, Aug 24, Reuter: Relief team’s moved into remote areas of North India and Nepal on Wednesday, three days after a major earthquake shook the Himalayas, but officials said the death toll, exaggerated in early reports, was now about 730.
Rescuers on Wednesday dug out victims trapped, injured or dead under rubble since the worst earthquake in the region for 50 years, and in the Nepalese Capital of Kathmandu panic spread after astrologers predicted a new major tremor.
Witnesses in Kathmandu said many people left their homes in panic after rumours the U.S. Geological survey had predicted an imminent new earthquake. The USS. Information Service denied any such prediction, and the rumours was traced to local astrologers.
In India’s Bihar State, Cabinet Secretary S.K. Lal raised the official death tally to 183still far below the 450 local officials had first mentioned. He said Air Force helicopters were still ferrying the injured to hospital from villages where rescue work continued.
Across the border in Nepal, the home (interior) ministry said the confirmed number of dead was 549 with 857 injured.
Relief Teams were still heading into remote areas in the Southeast of the country, which has tenuous communications at the best of times, where more victims were expected to be found.
A relief committee chaired by Prime Minister Marich Man Singh Shrestha appealed for private donations and in response to Nepal’s cry for international Paid, a British and French medical teams flew into Dharan, the worst affected town on Tuesday.
British Army units were helping clear rubble and release victims still trapped in villages around Dharan, a recruiting centre for Nepalese Gurkhas who still form several British Army battalions.
Article extracted from this publication >> August 26, 1988
