There is a lot of horror and sadness in Italy at the moment, as the country was hit with a massive 6.2 magnitude natural disaster early Wednesday morning, with aftershocks clocking in at around 5 or even higher.
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The quakes, which were strongest in central Italy, have reportedly killed 247 people so far.
Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said on Thursday that a number of Britons had been “affected” by the quake, which has left at least 250 people dead and levelled three small towns after it struck in the early hours of Wednesday.
“We share in the grief of the lives cut short by this bad event”.
“The British Government has offered any assistance that we can to help with the recovery effort and I have spoken with Italian foreign minister Paolo Gentiloni to express my condolences personally”.
The Foreign Office would not confirm the report.
Numerous dead are believed to be children.
“Canada continues to stand behind the people of Italy during this hard period”.
Hundreds of aftershocks have rocked devastated areas of central Italy, hampering search efforts in the cluster of mountain communities 65 miles north-east of Rome hit. Rescuers refused to say when their work would shift from saving lives to recovering bodies, noting that one person was pulled alive from the rubble 72 hours after the 2009 quake in the nearby town of L’Aquila.
The civil protection agency set up tent cities around the affected towns to accommodate the homeless, 1,200 of whom took advantage of the offer to spend the night, civil protection officials said Thursday.
Charitable assistance began pouring into the quake zone in traffic-clogging droves Thursday. In Amatrice, some 50 elderly and children spent the night inside a local sports facility.
The UK government has already pledged to send help. Other assistance was spiritual. “They have given us a lovely example, because their pain did not take away their dignity”.
The Italy quake is devastating. But he called suggestions that Italy could construct earthquake-proof buildings “absurd”.
“We’re among the best in the world in managing emergencies”, Renzi said, praising the men and women, many of them volunteers, who jump into action when crises hit.
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In recent quakes, some of these more modern buildings have been the deadliest: the university dormitory that collapsed in the 2009 L’Aquila quake, killing 11 students; the elementary school that crumbled in San Giuliano di Puglia in 2002, killing 26 children – the town’s entire first-grade class. Their convictions were overturned on appeal.
