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497 quakes hit NW Turkey in 3 days

Xinhua, February 8, 2017 Adjust font size:

A total of 497 earthquakes, mostly minor ones, have stricken Turkey's northwestern province of Canakkale over the past three days, forcing relief agencies to set up container shelters in the region, local media reported on Wednesday.

The first wave of the tremors was recorded early Monday morning at Ayvacik district with a magnitude of 5.3, which left 8 people with minor injuries, according to the Canakkale governor's office.

The aftershocks, however, damaged some 300 houses, forcing local residents to live in tents established by the Disaster and Emergency Management Authority and the Turkish Red Crescent, press reports said.

As the quakes continued to rock the region on Wednesday, the two relief agencies decided to set up container shelters and move in the victims before sunset to better protect them from cold weather, according to CNNTurk.

Meanwhile, Mehmet Ozhaseki, Turkey's environment and urbanization minister, cautioned that some 42 percent of the country's territory is on active fault lines.

"We need to act keeping this reality in mind," Ozhaseki was quoted as saying by the Hurriyet daily. "We should build safe buildings on stable bases."

A total of 605 people were killed in November 2011, when a 7.2-magnitude tremor hit the eastern part of Turkey.

Another two powerful quakes, measuring 7.4 and 7.2 magnitudes respectively, claimed some 18,000 lives in Turkey in 1999. Endit