'Everything went wobbly'

2006-02-23 09:58

Johannesburg - Guests at Tivoli Hotel in the port city of Beira, Mozambique, were too scared to return to their rooms after a major earthquake hit the country early on Thursday morning.

Mozambican Gilbert Cochelane, a guest at the hotel, said that a second earthquake, presumably an aftershock, hit the area about 03:00.

Cochelane said: "Everything started shaking again about 03:00. No one is sleeping. The electricity is out, everything is in darkness, and we are very scared."

Another guest said that she woke up about 30 seconds before the first earthquake hit.

'We couldn't see the stars'

A woman, who preferred to remain anonymous, said: "It felt like being in a boat on heavy seas. Everything went wobbly. I looked at the air conditioner in my room and it was slightly skew, the floor also. But nothing fell."

She said that shortly after the earthquake, it started raining. "We couldn't see the stars, and then suddenly it rained."

She said the second tremor was a lot less violent. "It just slightly shook."

The woman said there were about 60 guests from all over Africa, as well as the United States, at the hotel.

Hotel uses emergency generator

She said: "We are all very anxious. The radio is not very helpful and we are not getting any real information about what happened and what we are suppose to do.

"We heard that a building had collapsed, but we can't see anything." She said the electricity in Beira was out, but the hotel had an emergency generator.

According to the US Geological Survey, the earthquake had a magnitude of 7.5 on the Richter scale. It struck at 12:19. The epicentre was located about 140 miles southwest of Beira.

The aftershock registered 1.7 on the Richter scale. No further reports of damage had been received.

- SAPA