20 dead and hundreds injured in an earthquake in Balochistan, southern Pakistan

A damaged house is seen a day after a 7.7 magnitude earthquake in Chitral, Pakistan, 27 October 2015. Troops and rescuers were scrambling to reach thousands of feared people trapped under rubble in northern Pakistan on 27 October, a day after a powerful earthquake that so far has killed over 300 people in the region, including 230 in Pakistan.  More than 1,200 injured people were being treated at hospitals in the north-western province of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, Chief Minister Pervaiz Khattak said.

Effects of a devastating earthquake in northern Pakistan in 2015

At least 20 people were killed and more than 300 injured in an earthquake that struck the southern Pakistani province of Balochistan early Thursday, the authorities said.

"The information we received indicates that 20 people were killed in the earthquake. Rescue operations are still underway," said the provincial interior minister, Ziaullah Langao, adding that more than 300 people were injured.

According to the US Geological Survey, an earthquake measuring 5.9 degrees per hour (3 am local time) struck the state, with its epicenter located at a depth of 20 km and 100 km from the provincial capital, Quetta, and was felt by the residents of this city and many cities and towns of the region.

The area most affected by the earthquake is Harnai, a mountainous city that is difficult for relief teams to reach because there are no paved roads and where the electricity and telephone networks are rudimentary.

And the French press agency quoted Zaher Tarin, an official at Harnai General Hospital, as saying that the earthquake led to a power outage in the area, forcing workers in the hospital, which already suffers from poor equipment, to work in the dark.

He explained that "the majority of the wounded who arrived at the hospital suffer from broken limbs." Dozens of people were returned to their homes after receiving first aid, and about 40 others were seriously injured, and they were transported to Quetta in ambulances.

Pakistan experiences frequent earthquakes because it lies at the meeting point of the Indian and Eurasian tectonic plates. In October 2015, a 7.5-magnitude earthquake killed 400 people in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Ten years ago, on October 8, 2005, a 7.6-magnitude earthquake left more than 73,000 dead and 3.5 million homeless, most of them in the Pakistani-controlled part of Kashmir.