A POWERFUL earthquake has struck the Philippines, killing at least 32 people, destroying buildings and triggering tsunami alerts across Asia.
More than 100 people were also injured when the magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck off the island of Mindanao shortly before 7:40am local time on Monday (23:40 GMT, Sunday), according to the United States Geological Survey.
The initial earthquake was followed by more than an hour of aftershocks, according to the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS).
General Santos, a city of 722,000 people in southern Mindanao, sustained some of the most serious damage.
PHIVOLCS said the city, located in the southern region of Soccsksargen, experienced the “very strong” event on its internal intensity scale.
Video posted on official social media channels showed a three-storey building that housed a Jollibee restaurant collapsing in a cloud of debris and dust, startling onlookers.
Other images showed extensive damage to buildings, including smashed windows and caved-in roofs.
Police spokesperson Robert Dagun told a local radio station that parts of the city’s St Elizabeth Hospital were severely damaged, forcing patients and medical personnel to evacuate and temporarily operate outside the main hospital building.
Mary Ann Blanco Rhudy, a Catholic nun working for Notre Dame of Dadiangas University in General Santos, said she was travelling to the college when the earthquake struck.
“The cars on the road were moving erratically. I am lucky that they didn’t crash against each other,” she told Al Jazeera.
“The trees on the side of the road were also swaying violently.”
Rhudy said some of the buildings at the college had partially collapsed.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr said emergency agencies had been activated, including the Office of Civil Defence and the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.
Marcos said he had ordered the closure of schools in affected areas.
According to the state-run Philippine News Agency, 3.2 million students and 128,000 teachers and personnel were affected on what was meant to be the first day of school in the country.
“The safety of our children comes first,” Marcos said.
Authorities across Asia issued and later cancelled tsunami warnings, including in the Philippines and Indonesia, but a tsunami advisory remained in place for Japan’s southern coast and outlying islands, where residents were urged to stay away from river mouths and coastal areas until further notice.