Peru 6.2-Magnitude Earthquake Injures 119 and Damages Homes
January 30, 2012, 6:18 PM ESTBy John Quigley
(Updates number of injured in first paragraph, aftershock in sixth paragraph.)
Jan. 30 (Bloomberg) -- An earthquake measuring 6.2 on the Richter scale struck Peru’s southern coast at about midnight local time, leaving at least 119 people injured.
The temblor knocked out power temporarily and damaged buildings near the epicenter in Ica, about 270 kilometers (168 miles) south of capital Lima, Peru’s civil defense authority said in an e-mailed statement.
The quake shook buildings in Lima and was felt in cities in the southern highlands and along Peru’s northern coast. In Ica, people remained outside their homes for the rest of the night fearing aftershocks, Radio Programas reported. Residents in the port of Pisco concerned the quake might trigger a tsunami fled to higher ground. No tsunami alert has been issued, said Soledad Arevalo, a civil defense authority spokeswoman, in a phone interview from Lima.
Southern Copper Corp., Peru’s largest producer of the metal, didn’t sustain any damage at its mines or smelter, said a company official briefed on the matter, declining to be named because of company policy. Pluspetrol SA said its Camisea natural gas plant in the coastal port of Pisco is operating normally.
Peru is the world’s third largest copper and zinc producer and sixth largest in gold.
The earthquake hit at 12:10 a.m. local time at a depth of 54 kilometers, according to the Peruvian Geophysical Institute’s website. It was followed by a magnitude 4 aftershock nine hours later.
The area was devastated by a magnitude-8 quake in 2007, Peru’s worst in more than 30 years, killing at least 510 people and leaving another 80,000 homeless.
The Lima General Index of stocks retreated 0.2 percent to 21,806.91 at 11:58 a.m. local time. The Peruvian sol was little changed at 2.6910 per U.S. dollar, according to Deutsche Bank AG’s local unit.
--With reporting by Alex Emery in Lima. Editors: Philip Sanders, Robert Jameson
To contact the reporters on this story: John Quigley in Lima at jquigley8@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Joshua Goodman at jgoodman19@bloomberg.net.
