Troops were drafted in following the quake, which measured 5.3 on the Richter scale in the farming town of Lorca. It struck at 6.47pm local time (4.47pm GMT)
Spain’s Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero has deployed 150 emergency military troops to search for people trapped under rumble in the town, 75 miles south west of Alicante.
Houses collapsed and a number of public buildings were toppled, with tremors felt hundreds of miles away in resorts popular with British holidaymakers.
Lorca’s mayor, Francisco Jodar confirmed the deaths on local radio saying the victims had been killed by “cave-ins and falling debris” during what is believed to be the worst quake to hit the country for 50 years.
Troops were drafted in following the quake, which measured 5.3 on the Richter scale in the farming town of Lorca. It struck at 6.47pm local time (4.47pm GMT)
Spain’s Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero has deployed 150 emergency military troops to search for people trapped under rumble in the town, 75 miles south west of Alicante.
Houses collapsed and a number of public buildings were toppled, with tremors felt hundreds of miles away in resorts popular with British holidaymakers.
Lorca’s mayor, Francisco Jodar confirmed the deaths on local radio saying the victims had been killed by “cave-ins and falling debris” during what is believed to be the worst quake to hit the country for 50 years.
One woman told Spanish national radio: "We were just sat here and everything began to move. Pictures fell from the wall, the TV fell and (the quake) went on for ages. We looked out of the window and there were a lot of people running."
As well as the emergency services, psychologists were sent to the area to help traumatised residents.
Lorca has a population of 90,000 and the old part of the town is a network of narrow alleyways. It dates back to the Bronze Age and its historic features include a Roman military column and medieval walls. John Bellini, a seismologist with the US Geological Survey's National Earthquake Information Center in Colorado, said the larger earthquake had a preliminary magnitude of 5.3 on the Richter scale and struck 220 miles (350km) south-southeast of Madrid. It was estimated to have occurred at a depth of some six miles (10km).
The last fatal earthquake to hit the country was in 1997, when one person was killed.
