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Earthquakes in Myanmar and Thailand kill dozens, leave workers trapped under toppled Bangkok skyscraper

March 28, 2025 Benjamin Hughes

Bangkok — Two violent earthquakes rocked Southeast Asia on Friday, killing at least 144 people in Myanmar, according to the country’s military rulers. At least 10 people died in Thailand‘s capital Bangkok, where a high-rise building that was under construction collapsed, leaving dozens more missing under the rubble.

A state of emergency was declared in Bangkok and in six regions and states in neighboring Myanmar, including its capital Naypyitaw. The head of Myanmar’s ruling junta said in a televised speech Friday evening that more than 150 people were killed and 730 others injured in the disaster, and he appealed for international help.

“The death toll and injuries are expected to rise,” Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing said. 

President Trump on Friday vowed the United States would assist Myanmar after a huge earthquake hit the country, the AFP reported, following a rare plea for aid by the Southeast Asian nation’s ruling junta.

Mr. Trump told reporters in the Oval Office he’d already spoken to the country and “It’s a real bad one, and we will be helping.”

A hospital in the Naypyitaw was struggling to deal with mass casualties after sustaining serious damage in the quake.

The U.S. Geological Survey and Germany’s GFZ center for geosciences said the first quake had a magnitude of 7.7 and was at the relatively shallow depth of about 6 miles. Its epicenter was in Myanmar, according to preliminary reports, near the city of Mandalay. An aftershock with a magnitude of 6.4 shook the region 12 minutes later.

Destruction in Myanmar

Myanmar is in the midst of a civil war and many areas are not easily accessible. Photos from Naypyidaw showed multiple buildings used to house civil servants destroyed by the quake, and rescue crews pulling victims from the rubble.

The government said blood was in high demand in the hardest-hit areas. Images of buckled and cracked roads in Mandalay and damaged highways as well as the collapse of a bridge and dam raised further concerns about how rescuers would even reach some areas in a country already enduring a widespread humanitarian crisis.

It was not immediately clear what relief efforts the ruling military regime would be able to provide, but it issued appeals for any help available, including blood supplies, from the international community. The major hospital in the country’s capital that sustained significant damage was described as a mass casualty area, as medics raced to treat the wounded in an outdoor triage area.

The hospital’s emergency department was heavily damaged, and images showed a car crushed under the concrete roof that had covered its entrance.

“Many injured people have been arriving, I haven’t seen anything like this before,” a doctor at the facility told AFP. “We are trying to handle the situation. I’m so exhausted.”

AFP journalists at the scene said people were crying in pain and others lay still as relatives tried to offer comfort.

“Hundreds of injured people are arriving… but the emergency building here also collapsed,” security officials at the hospital told AFP.

The powerful temblor damaged part of the former royal palace in Mandalay and other buildings, according to videos and photos posted to social media.

In the Sagaing region just southwest of Mandalay, a 90-year-old bridge collapsed, and some sections of the highway connecting Mandalay and Myanmar’s largest city, Yangon, were also damaged. 

A team of AFP journalists was at the National Museum in Naypyidaw when the first temblor hit, and they said pieces fell from the ceiling as the building began shaking, and nearby roads buckled.

Under-construction skyscraper collapses in Bangkok 

In densely populated Bangkok, city authorities said 10 people were killed, 16 injured and 101 missing from three construction sites, including the collapsed high-rise. The quakes set tall buildings swaying and prompted thousands of people to pour into streets across the city. Trading was halted on the stock exchange and public transport networks shut down in the Thai capital. 

The collapsed building was being constructed by the China Railway Construction Corporation for Thailand’s government auditor general.

Videos posted on social media showed the moment the 33-story high-rise came tumbling down, sending a massive cloud of dust into the air as workers ran away from the site. 

Rescue worker Songwut Wangpon told reporters that seven people were found alive, as he spoke next to the tall pile of rubble that was once the unfinished building near Bangkok’s popular Chatuchak Market.

Water from high-rise rooftop pools in Bangkok sloshed over the sides of the buildings as they shook from the first quake, and debris fell from many skyscrapers.

Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra called an emergency meeting to assess the impact of the temblors.

The greater Bangkok area is home to more than 17 million people, many of whom live in high-rise apartments.

Alarms went off in buildings when the first quake hit around 1:30 p.m., and startled residents were evacuated down staircases of high-rise condominiums and hotels in densely populated central Bangkok.

They remained in the streets, seeking shade from the midday sun in the minutes after the first quake, and were cautioned to stay outside in case there were more aftershocks.

“All of a sudden the whole building began to move, immediately there was screaming and a lot of panic,” said Fraser Morton, a tourist from Scotland, who was in one of Bangkok’s many malls shopping for camera equipment.

“I just started walking calmly at first but then the building started really moving, yeah, a lot of screaming, a lot of panic, people running the wrong way down the escalators, lots of banging and crashing inside the mall.”

Like thousands of others in downtown Bangkok, Morton sought refuge in Benjasiri Park — away from the tall buildings all around.

“I got outside and then looked up at the building and the whole building was moving, dust and debris, it was pretty intense,” he said. “Lots of chaos.”

Thailand’s Department of Disaster Prevention said the first quake was felt in almost all regions of the country.

Source: cbsnews.com