Death toll in Haiti quake rises to 15
The death toll from a 5.9 earthquake that hit Haiti over the weekend rose to at least 15 people with 333 injured, according to updated figures released Monday by authorities, as rescue crews worked to help victims spooked by strong aftershocks.
Haiti's civil protection agency said in a statement that it will soon deploy 70 soldiers to the Nord-Ouest and Artibonite provinces that were hardest hit, noting it already sent 14 soldiers along with nurses and doctors to the area over the weekend.
Thousands of people along Haiti's north coast have dragged mattresses and chairs outside, fearing new aftershocks. Many wondered how they were going to rebuild from Saturday night's quake and a strong 5.2 magnitude aftershock on Sunday that had residents in the coastal city of Port-de-Paix and elsewhere worried about returning to their cracked cinderblock homes for fear they would collapse. Among them was Marc-Sena Docteur, a 24-year-old carpenter whose girlfriend died in the earthquake. "Now I'm left with a 9-month-old baby with no aid at all," he said.
