Nepal quake: Municipality at epicentre miraculously escapes destruction despite widespread havoc
Story highlights
The District Administration Office (DAO), Jajarkot, confirmed that no deaths were reported in Barekot Rural Municipality.
The devastating trail of earthquake in Nepal dodged a set of municipal workers, which is currently being hailed as a miracle in and beyond the Himalayan country sandwiched between India and China.
Where the deadly quake claimed the lives of at least 157, the municipality in Nepal's Jajarkot district reported no casualties, as per a media report on Sunday (Nov 5).
According to the National Earthquake Monitoring and Research Centre, an earthquake of magnitude 6.4 with its epicentre at the Ramidanda village in Barekot Rural Municipality shook the country on Friday (Nov 3) just before midnight.
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Miraculous escape
Despite the incident causing extensive damage to houses and public infrastructure, the rural municipality somehow miraculously escaped death as of Saturday evening, news agency PTI reported citing the Kathmandu Post newspaper.
“When we see the badly damaged houses, it is difficult to believe how we all cheated death in the area,” said Bir Bahadur Giri, chairperson of the rural municipality. “It is a divine land, and many people believe God saved them.”
He said that the incident left five people injured in the rural municipality, out of which, two received treatment at the local health office while three were flown to a Surkhet-based hospital, reported the newspaper.
The rural municipality approximately comprises 3,500 houses.
“There is hardly any house undamaged by the earthquake. At least 90 per cent of them need to be rebuilt while around 1,000 houses have been badly hit and people have been staying in open spaces,” said Giri.
The District Administration Office (DAO), Jajarkot, confirmed that no deaths were reported in Barekot Rural Municipality.
On Saturday evening, the DAO took to its official Facebook handle and said that as many as 105 people lost their lives in the Jajarkot district, out of which, 55 were killed in Nalgaad Municipality, 42 in Bheri Municipality, seven in Kushe Rural Municipality and one in Chhedagad Municipality.
No human casualties have been reported by the DAO at Barekot Rural Municipality, which was the epicentre of the deadly earthquake.
Giri said that he narrowly escaped death after a wall of his house crumbled due to the strong tremors.
“Not only me, many others are sharing similar experiences,” he said.
Sparse settlement
The experts cited a sparse settlement while weighing in on the reasons behind the lack of casualties at Ramidanda village.
“Nobody was dead [even] in the Silpachaur area nearby that is more densely populated despite massive damage to the houses,” said Dinayat Gharti, chief administrative officer at the rural municipality.
“Nobody was dead [even] in the Silpachaur area nearby that is more densely populated despite massive damage to the houses,” said Dinayat Gharti, chief administrative officer at the rural municipality.
According to experts, the epicentre does not necessarily sustain more physical damage than other locations.
“But it is rare and even miraculous for the epicentre to avoid any human causality in a big quake is rare and miraculous,” said Amod Mani Dixit, president of the National Society for Earthquake Technology-Nepal (NSET), an institution formed by Nepali professionals working in the field of disaster risk management.
(With inputs from agencies)
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