The earthquake that jolted Islamabad, Peshawar, Lahore and Northern Areas (NA) on Sunday and Monday morning, recorded at 5.9 and 5.7 on Richter scale respectively, were not destructive, but the shocks will continue for one more week, said Director General of Islamabad Meteorological Department Qamar-uz-Zaman while talking to Business Recorder here on Monday.
He said that the epicentre of this earthquake was located in the Hindukush Mountains. He said that the magnitude of the earthquake was high, but due to a depth of 173-kilometre down it was not so much destructive as compared to the earthquake of October 29, 2008, which struck Quetta and several districts of the Balochistan province last year, causing widespread destruction.
Its epicentre was 112 kilometres north of Quetta. The area was prone to earthquake, he said. "The earthquake, which occurred in Balochistan was a shallow one, which was very destructive, Qamar Zaman, said. He said: "We have installed Tsunami Predictor warring system in Karachi, which gives warning in advance about the occurring Tsunami, but there is no system in the world which warns about the earthquake." He said that Pakistan lay in a high seismic activity area. In 2005, a 7.8-magnitude earthquake killed more than 75,000 people in the northern region and Kashmir.