Earthquake | featured news

Overcrowded hospitals in northwestern Iran struggled to cope with thousands of earthquake victims on Sunday and rescuers raced to reach remote villages after two powerful quakes killed nearly 300 people.

Chinese officials say a strong earthquake has struck a remote area of the country's far-western Xinjiang region. The government earthquake monitoring center said the quake registered magnitude 6.2 and hit Sunday evening. It said it was centered 175 miles southeast of the oasis city of Hotan. The area is deep in the thinly populated Kunlun mountains.

Two strong earthquakes leveled villages and damaged homes in northwestern Iran on Saturday, killing at least 180 people and injuring more than 1,350 others, state TV reported. Thousands of people spent the night outdoors as aftershocks rattled the area.

A cluster of earthquakes that began Tuesday night continued Wednesday in northern Orange County, keeping residents on edge but causing little significant damage. Photos emerged of bottles falling off a supermarket shelf in Anaheim Hills, but fire officials said they didn't get reports of anything more serious. At a news conference Wednesday morning, Kate Hutton of the U.S. Geological Survey at Caltech said there had been at least 30 quakes since last night, but only three could be felt by residents.

A minor earthquake has rattled the same Virginia area that was at the center of last year's East Coast quake.

Japan's government on Saturday approved bringing the country's first nuclear reactors back online since last year's earthquake and tsunami led to a nationwide shutdown, going against wider public opinion that is opposed to nuclear power after Fukushima....

As many as 50 people are feared entombed under tons of rock and stone that buried a village in a landslide after two earthquakes in northern Afghanistan, authorities said Tuesday....

A strong earthquake off Indonesia's coast caused tall buildings to sway in the capital Monday afternoon, but officials said there was no threat of a tsunami. Office workers said the swaying was felt for about 10 seconds in high-rise buildings around the city of 9 million people. Even two-story residential homes shook strongly. No damage or casualties were immediately reported.

A 5.8 magnitude tremor shook the Emilia Romagna region where a devastating quake struck less than 10 days ago.

A strong earthquake struck early Sunday in northern Italy, killing at least three people and knocking down a church bell in the region, authorities said.