Dozens Missing at Hotel in Italy After 'Immense' Avalanche

[Mystic Wanderer]

A handout picture provided by the Italian Fire Department shows an aerial view of hotel Rigopiano after it was hit by an avalanche in Farindola, in the Abruzzo region of Italy, early on January 19, 2017. According to an Italian mountain rescue team, several people have been killed in an avalanche that hit a hotel near the Gran Sasso mountain in Abruzzo region. Authorities believe that the avalanche was triggered by a series of earthquakes in central Italy on Wednesday. Photo by Italian Fire Department/European Pressphoto Agency

These people have been through it!  Several hours earlier, there were a series of earthquakes that closed schools, and could be responsible for setting off this avalanche that buried a hotel, possibly killing as many as 30 people inside.

The Hotel Rigopiano near the Gran Sasso mountain in central Italy was hit by an avalanche early Thursday, after four earthquakes shook the mountain region of the country the day before and a series of aftershocks was felt throughout the night.

There were at least 20 tourists and seven staff members inside the hotel when the avalanche hit, rescuers say. Though they were unsure when it buried the hotel, they said it is possible those inside were trapped by snow and rubble for as long as 24 hours.
"There are many deaths," said Antonio Crocetta, the head of the Abruzzi mountain rescue team.

The Abruzzo region of Italy, as well as Marche and Lazio, were pounded by several days of heavy snow which already had made it difficult for emergency personnel to get to villages.

The "immense" avalanche is thought to have happened sometime closer to the earthquakes, which caused schools and transit systems in Rome -- some 50 miles away -- to be evacuated and closed.

Witnesses said the avalanche took out a wooded area, as well as cars, animals and part of the hotel. Local residents in Farindola, where the hotel is located, called emergency officials because they could see the roof had collapsed.

Rescuers, who needed skis and a helicopter to reach the hotel because of more than two meters of snow on the ground, already reported one person found outside the hotel had died and another was taken to the hospital to be treated for hypothermia in serious condition but is expected to survive.

Source

This is a breaking story, so all the details are not out yet. I hope they find more survivors.
My thoughts and prayers go out to these people.

[1984hasarrived]

There are a multitude of different faults that cut through the Apennines mountains but the key players over recent months have been two neighbouring faults called the Laga and Vetorre faults.
August's big Magnitude 6.2 jolt, which killed 299 people, occurred on the northern end of the Laga, and ruptured the crust further north still, on to the Vetorre fault.
Then came October with a swathe of quakes that broke much of the rest of the Vetorre. But the stress, according to the seismologists, wasn't just sent north, it was loaded south as well - south of August's event.
And it's in this zone that we have now seen a series of quakes in the past day or so. About a dozen Magnitude fours and fives.

From BBC

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-38679129

[guohua]

WOW, How Sad!