Mexico rattled but unhurt after quake

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -- An earthquake measuring 5.9 on the open-ended Richter scale rocked central Mexico early on Friday, but national emergency services said no one had been injured and no serious damage had been reported.

"We confirm there's been no effect," a spokesman for the federal Civil Protection told Reuters.

The earthquake, which struck at 1:14 a.m. (2:14 a.m. EDT/0614 GMT), measured 5.9 magnitude and its epicenter was on the border of the central-southern states of Puebla and Guerrero about 100 miles (160 km) south of the capital, said an official with the Seismological Service of Mexico City's National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).

The epicenter was in a remote and sparsely populated area.

Officials said that no reports of casualties or damages had been received, but government news agency Notimex, citing local Civil Protection officials, said the roof and wall of a house in the town of Iguala, Guerrero state, had fallen in.

"It (the epicenter) appears to have been deep," said Ricardo Barron of the UNAM Seismological Service.

John Minsch of the U.S. Geological Survey in Golden, Colorado, said they measured the quake at 5.4 and placed it 105 miles (168 km) south-southeast of Mexico City.

"This is moderate for that area," Minsch told Reuters. "Strong enough and close enough to be felt in Mexico City."

A quake measuring 5.0 on the Richter scale is capable of causing considerable damage, depending on how deep it is centered, how close the epicenter is to populated areas and other factors.

In the colonial city of Puebla, shaken already by two big earthquakes in the past 13 months, authorities reported no damage or injuries.

According to preliminary reports, people were frightened but no buildings collapsed in Puebla City, the Puebla state Interior Secretary Carlos Alberto Julian told Notimex.

A duty officer at the Red Cross office in Puebla said residents appeared to have come through the quake uninjured. "Only nervous crises; everything's under control," he said.

Puebla Mayor Mario Tarin Torres said he had not heard of any new damage to the churches or other historic buildings that have been undergoing repair since a powerful 6.7 temblor on June 15, 1999.

Nineteen people died in that quake, which crumbled the domes and spires of colonial-era churches and brought down the mud-brick houses of poor people in several states.

On September 30, 1999 an earthquake measuring 7.4 on the Richter scale, centered on the coast of Oaxaca state, shook 13 Mexican states and killed at least 15 people. Puebla suffered further damage in that temblor.

When Friday's latest quake hit, Puebla residents ran from their houses in panic, remembering the damage that occurred in the previous quakes, Mexican radio said.

During the tremor, which lasted for about a minute, buildings in the downtown part of Mexico City shook sickeningly but the quake was not strong enough to knock pictures off walls or dishes off shelves.

Although lights went off briefly in some parts of the enormous capital -- heart of an urban area of some 18 million people -- electrical and telephone service were generally uninterrupted.

In Mexico City, some people also ran for the exits, local radio reported. Many residents can recall a massive earthquake -- of 8.2 magnitude -- in 1985 that claimed around 10,000 lives in the capital.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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