SOUTH AMERICA

6.8 earthquake hits Colombia's western coast

A 6.8-magnitude earthquake struck off the Pacific Coast of Colombia on Sunday night, collapsing homes and injuring at least four people in the country's rural southwest, but causing no reported deaths, officials said.

From the Associated Press
02:58 AM PDT, September 10, 2007

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BOGOTA, Colombia -- The quake hit at 8:49 p.m. local time and was centered about six miles beneath the ocean floor just off the coast, some 295 miles southwest of Bogota, the U.S. Geological Survey reported. No tsunami warning was issued.

It was felt across several states in western Colombia, including the cities of Cali and Popayan.

In the town of El Charco, near the epicenter, Caracol Radio reported there were four people injured after some 20 homes near the coast collapsed or were damaged by flooding.

"We'll know more when the sun rises and can do a full survey of the hardest hit area, but it doesn't appear to have caused any deaths or major damage," said Carlos Sanchez, a seismologist for Ingeominas, Colombia's geological institute.

Earthquakes are frequent occurrence across the Andean nation, though they are rarely deadly.