Killer quake creates island

Baluchistan, Pakistan

A massive earthquake in Pakistan’s province of Baluchistan killed hundreds of people and created a new island off the coast.

The magnitude-7.7 tremor flattened entire mud-brick villages. Troops deployed to fight an insurgency of separatist Baluchis were on hand to help rescue people, but the affected area is so huge that it will take days to reach some trapped victims. “We are seriously lacking medical facilities, and there is no space to treat injured people in the local hospitals,” said provincial spokesman Jan Muhammad Buledi.

The new island, a mound of dirt about 70 feet high and the length of two football fields, isn’t expected to be permanent. Such masses sometimes spring up and then disappear after heavy rains.