After the devastating earthquake in Morocco, there was an aftershock on Sunday morning. The country was shaken by a new quake around 9 a.m. local time, Nasser Jabour, head of a department at the National Institute of Geophysics, told the Moroccan news site Hespress.
The USGS recorded a magnitude of 3.9. According to Hespress, the epicenter of the aftershock was about 80 kilometers southwest of Marrakesh, similar to the first quake. It is not known whether there were further victims as a result.
After the devastating earthquake in Morocco that left more than 2,000 dead, a special Spanish military unit flew to the North African country. The Ministry of Defense announced on the X platform, formerly known as Twitter, that 56 members of the Military Emergency Relief Unit UME boarded an A400 transport plane in Zaragoza on Sunday together with four search dogs. The North African country had previously sent a formal request for assistance to Spain, as Spanish media consistently reported.
Members of the Fire Department without Borders from Spain were already in Morocco on Sunday, traveling overland to the particularly affected area in the Atlas Mountains south of the city of Marrakech, which is also popular with tourists. “We are still about two hours from the epicenter,” the head of the operation, Antonio Nogales, told RTVE. The Spanish firefighters are in contact with the Moroccan authorities so that they can assign them an area of operations. Other professional fire departments, especially from the south of Spain, also sent helpers to the disaster area.
The epicenter of the earthquake on Friday evening with a magnitude of 6.8 was in the Atlas Mountains around 70 kilometers southwest of Marrakech, according to the USGS. Most of the victims were reported in the Al-Haouz province near the epicenter. The Interior Ministry in Rabat said the number of deaths was more than 2,000 on Sunday. At least as many were injured. It is feared that the number of victims will continue to rise.
