Six children hurt
Guwahati: Two units of Numaligarh Refinery Ltd (NRL) in Assam’s Golaghat district shut down automatically due to the intensity of an earthquake that jolted the state and its neighbours Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland.
Reports of minor damage in the moderate intensity quake were received from various parts of Assam, including the collapse of a school wall.
Two units of the NRL – hydrogen unit and hydrocarbon unit – shut down automatically due to the intensity of the tremor.
The refinery is about 40 km from the epicenter.
‘The refinery is fully automated. The units shut down automatically due to the tremor as a precautionary measure. They were restarted after about an hour,’ an official in the NRL said.
Local reports said minor damage to walls and structures were reported, though no major devastation has been reported yet.
The magnitude of the temblor, which struck at 0946 hours, was measured at 5.5 in Richter scale.
The epicenter latitude of the quake was 26.5 degree North and longitude was 93.5 degree East in Karbi Anglong district in Assam, according to IMD sources.
The tremors were felt a couple of times in many parts of Assam, while in Arunachal and Nagaland it lasted a few seconds.
In Golaghat district, bordering Karbi Anglong, cracks were reported in the wall and roof of a private school while the wall of a government school reportedly caved in under the impact of the quake.
Six children sustained minor injuries when a wall of the Mahuramukh Lokapriya Prathamik Vidalaya near Numaligarh caved in.
Teachers and students had a close shave at the Adharsatra Mukhtab LP School as classes had already started for the day when the quake hit the state. One of the school walls collapsed.
Cracks were also reported in one of the classrooms of Sacred Heart school in Golaghat.
Reports of cracks in skyrises, schools and houses were also coming in from Mariani, Jorhat, Bokakhat and Kaziranga areas, all in bordering districts of Karbi Anglong.
Reports from Itanagar said window panes shattered due to the impact of the quake.
Panic-stricken people rushed out of their homes.
This was the first of quake in this month in Arunachal Pradesh, which had recorded three moderate intensity tremors last month.
In Nagaland too people rushed out of their homes. The tremor was felt for about seven to eight seconds.
The quake occurred at a depth of 20 km from the earth’s surface.
The North Eastern states are in seismic zone V, making it highly susceptible to quakes. (UNI)
