Authorities said five people were killed and at least 20 were injured.
A strong earthquake hit central Croatia on Tuesday, destroying buildings and sending panicked people fleeing into rubble-covered streets in a town southeast of the capital. Authorities said five people were killed and at least 20 were injured. The European Mediterranean Seismological Center said a magnitude 6.3 quake hit 28 miles southeast of Zagreb. It caused widespread damage in the hardest-hit town of Petrinja. The same area was struck by a 5.2 quake on Monday. Officials said a 12-year-old girl died in Petrinja, a town of some 25,000 people. Another four people were killed in villages near the town, according to the state HRT television. At least 20 people were hospitalized, two with serious injuries, officials said. « The center of Petrinja as it used to be no longer exists, » HRT reported, saying people remained inside collapsed buildings. « My town has been completely destroyed. We have dead children, » Petrinja Mayor Darinko Dumbovic said in a statement broadcast by HRT. « This is like Hiroshima – half of the city no longer exists. » Marica Pavlovic, a resident, said the quake felt « worse than a war. » « It was horrible, a shock, you don’t know what to do, whether to run out or hide somewhere, » she told The Associated Press.
