Aftershocks rattle Mandalay as rescuers search for survivors in Myanmar quake

AFP

Residents scrambled desperately through collapsed buildings Sunday searching for survivors as aftershocks rattled the devastated city of Mandalay, two days after a massive earthquake killed more than 1,600 people in Myanmar and at least 17 in neighbouring Thailand.

The initial 7.7-magnitude quake struck near the central Myanmar city of Mandalay early Friday afternoon, followed minutes later by a 6.7-magnitude aftershock.

The tremors collapsed buildings, downed bridges and buckled road

s, with mass destruction seen in the city of more than 1.7 million people.

As dawn broke Sunday, tea shop owner Win Lwin picked his way through the remains of a collapsed restaurant on a main road in his neighbourhood, tossing bricks aside one by one.