• Source:JND
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Philippines Earthquake Viral Videos: A powerful 6.9-magnitude earthquake struck the central Philippines on Tuesday, causing the partial collapse of the historic Parish of Saint Peter the Apostle in Bantayan. Viral videos circulating on social media show the dramatic scene at the Cebu heritage church, where interior lights swayed wildly and chunks of its exterior facade were thrown away amid the intense shaking.

Dramatic footage: Cebu bridge shakes violently

In another video, a dashcam clip from a vehicle's dashboard shows scores of motorcyclists leaping off their bikes to clutch the railings for dear life as the entire structure shook. The car's occupants are heard gasping in panic, their voices rising in alarm as the tremors built to a ferocious crescendo.

In several other videos, people were seen moving dramatically following the deadly earthquake.

69 killed in Phillipines earthquake

At least 69 people were killed in a powerful earthquake that hit a central Philippine province where dozens of people were killed by a powerful earthquake Tuesday night. The magnitude-6.9 earthquake that hit at about 10 pm trapped an unspecified number of residents in collapsed houses, nightclubs and other businesses in the hard-hit city of Bogo and outlying rural towns in Cebu province, officials said.

Rescuers scrambled to find survivors on Wednesday. Army troops, police and civilian volunteers backed by backhoes and sniffer dogs were deployed Wednesday to carry out house-to-house searches for survivors.

The epicentre of the earthquake, which was set off by movement in an undersea fault line at a dangerously shallow depth of 5 kilometres, was about 19 kilometres northeast of Bogo, a coastal city of about 90,000 people in Cebu province, where about half of the deaths were reported, officials said.

Death toll in Bogo likely to increase

The death toll in Bogo was expected to rise, according to officials, who said intermittent rain and damaged bridges and roads were hampering the race to save lives. “We're still in the golden hour of our search and rescue,” Office of Civil Defence deputy administrator Bernardo Rafaelito Alejandro IV said in a news briefing. “There are still many reports of people who were pinned or hit by debris.”

The Philippine government is considering whether to seek help from foreign governments based on an ongoing rapid damage assessment, Alejandro said. Workers were trying to transport a backhoe to hasten search and rescue efforts in a cluster of shanties in a mountain village hit by a landslide and boulders, Bogo city disaster-mitigation officer Rex Ygot told The Associated Press early Wednesday.

“It's hard to move in the area because there are hazards,” said Glenn Ursal, another disaster-mitigation officer, who added that some survivors were brought to a hospital from the mountain village.

One of the most powerful earthquake

The earthquake was one of the most powerful to batter the central region in more than a decade and it struck while many people slept or were at home.

The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology briefly issued a tsunami warning and advised people to stay away from the coastlines of Cebu and the nearby provinces of Leyte and Biliran due to possible waves of up to 1 metre.

(With inputs from agency)