UPDATE-EARTHQUAKE | Major earthquake strikes in northern Luzon, five dead, 100 injured

July 27, 2022 , 04:53 PM

By Manny Mogato, News 5 editor-at-large

(July 27, 2022) – Five people were killed and about 100 were injured when a major earthquake struck a mountainous town in Abra on Wednesday morning, the national police chief said, quoting reports from regional offices.

Interior and Local Government Secretary Benhur Abalos said three regions were affected by the earthquake. Abra was the most affected with 29 towns reporting damages and casualties.

The government is still waiting for further reports from the field before declaring a state of calamity as many heritage sites in Ilocos region were damaged, including the belfry of the centuries-old Bantay Catholic church.

At 8:45 am,, a magnitude 7.1 earthquake struck in Lagangilang in Abra, Renato Solidum of the Philippines Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs) said. The tremor was tectonic and was traced to a movement in the Abra river fault line, which had not shifted since the late 19th century.

Solidum warned of several aftershocks and expected damages on weaker structures as well as those built on unstable ground not only in Abra but in other provinces, like Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur and La Union. Damages were also expected in Benguet, especially in Baguio City.

“The earthquake lasted from 30 seconds to a minute,” Solidum said, adding the quake was considered a major event, similar to the 2013 incident in Bohol and 1990 incident in Nueva Vizcaya that killed 1,600 people.

Lieutenant General Vicente Danao said nearly 200 structures were damaged in the Cordillera region alone, forcing hundreds of residents to evacuate to safer areas while about 58 landslides were reported, blocking major highways in the region.

Danao said regional police units are working closely with the military and local emergency units to search and rescue trapped residents and clear debris to make vital roads and communication lines operational.

Electricity as well as communications in some towns in Abra, Benguet, Kalinga and Mountain Province were cut off.

“Most of the fatalities were killed by falling debris and collapsing walls,” Danao told reporters, adding a hospital in Abra was evacuated after a portion of the facility collapsed.

One of the fatalities, Jonalyn Bilan Siganay, a 23-year-old student of Langiden, Abra, went out of her boarding house when the earthquake struck. But she was pinned down when a wall collapse and was declared dead an hour after she was rushed to the Seares Memorial Hospital

A 25-year-old construction worker, Aaron Col-eteng, was also killed when falling debris hit him while he was trying to run from a basement in Baguio City while Jefferson Basar died when he and other workers were hit by boulders at a quarry site in Kalinga.

In Ilocos Sur, 88 year-old Sevia Catalan was buried in a landslide while walking to her “kaingin” in Suyo town. A fifth fatality was also reported in Benguet.

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