Greek Earthquake Leaves 16 Dead, Scores Injured Hundreds Are Left Homeless After Early Morning Disaster

Slabs of cement dangled from crumpled buildings Thursday and shattered glass littered the streets after an early morning earthquake killed at least 16 people and left hundreds of others homeless.

The 3:15 a.m. quake toppled walls and buildings as residents slept in this southwestern port town.

Authorities declared about 500 buildings uninhabitable and set up 200 tents to house the homeless. Food supplies and water were trucked in to the stricken area.

At least 59 people were hospitalized with serious injuries, and dozens of others received emergency treatment before being released, the public works ministry reported.

The bodies of nine Greeks were pulled out of an apartment building that police said collapsed like “a house of cards,” while five French tourists died when a wing of the Eliki hotel collapsed. An Italian woman was also killed, and an elderly Greek woman died of a heart attack she suffered shortly after she was lifted from the debris.

Seven other French tourists were missing and feared dead in the hotel’s rubble, while seven Greeks in the apartment building were missing as well.

Hotel night watchman Yannis Bougas said he pulled two dead French visitors from the debris.

“There was a loud noise and the whole world turned to dust,” Bougas said, his shirt stained with blood. “I came out and saw part of the hotel had collapsed and ran to the area and started shouting to the French to get out, and those who could got out.”

Only the facade of the hotel’s fourstory wing was intact as rescuers lifted cement blocks Thursday to search for survivors. French and Swiss rescue workers with specially trained dogs flew in immediately to help search for survivors. As darkness set in, rescuers with huge cranes worked under the glare of flood lights.