A major earthquake has struck eastern Nepal, near Mount Everest, two weeks after more than 8,000 died in a devastating quake.
At least four people have been killed and an unknown number injured, according to aid agencies.
The latest earthquake hit near the town of Namche Bazaar, near Mount Everest.
The
US Geological Survey said it had a magnitude of 7.3. An earthquake on
25 April, centred in western Nepal, had a magnitude of 7.8.
The latest tremor was also felt in northern India and Bangladesh.
In
the Nepalese capital Kathmandu, which was badly damaged last month,
people rushed out of buildings as the quake struck at 12:35 local time
(07:50 GMT).
The BBC's Yogita Limaye, who was in Nepal's mountains when the latest earthquake struck, tweeted: "We're safe. Did feel the earth shake for quite a long time. Saw dust and stones flying off mountain near by."
She told BBC World News: "The earth shook and it shook for a pretty long time.
"I
can completely understand the sense of panic. We have been seeing
tremors: it's been two and a half weeks since the first quake.
"But this one really felt like it went on for a really long time. People have been terrified." Follow all the latest news on the Nepal earthquake with our live page
At least four people were killed in the town of Chautara, east of the
capital, Kathmandu, where a number of buildings are reported to have
collapsed.
The International Organisation for Migration said bodies were being pulled from rubble there.
The epicentre of the latest earthquake was 83km (52 miles) east of Kathmandu, in a rural area close to the Chinese border.
It struck at a depth of 18.5km (11.5 miles), according to the US Geological Survey.
The 25 April quake was 15km (9.3 miles) deep. Shallower earthquakes are more likely to cause more damage at the surface.
At the scene: Simon Cox, BBC reporter, Kathmandu
You
could feel it really strongly. You could feel it went on for about 25
seconds - the ground was shaking, the birds started squawking, you could
feel the buildings shaking.
There was another aftershock and
people were all out on the street. That aftershock really added anxiety
and panic. People started crying.
They are calm but you can tell they are all scared.
Large aftershock
Tuesday's earthquake is likely to be one of the largest to hit Nepal, which has suffered hundreds of aftershocks since 25 April.
The UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs warned that buildings had collapsed in Nepal.
The
7.3 quake was followed 30 minutes later by another large aftershock,
centred on the district of Ramechhap, east of Kathmandu, that had a magnitude of 6.3.
Analysis - Jonathan Amos, Science Correspondent
By
any stretch, a magnitude-7.3 quake is a big one. It's not quite as big
as 25 April (7.8), which was 5.5 times more energetic - but a major
tremor nonetheless.
Since 25 April, the immediate analysis had
suggested more activity on the fault was certainly possible because the
previous event had not ruptured all the way to the surface.
That
meant some of the strain built up in the rocks over the years had not
all been released. One has to hope that those buildings that were left
damaged and precarious the last time have since been felled in
subsequent aftershocks, or have been put out of bounds.
This will
limit the casualties this time. But further landslides and avalanches in
the mountainous terrain are a persistent risk. And, of course, another
big tremor does nothing for the frayed nerves of an already anxious
population.
Officials in Nepal say the death toll from last weekend's massive earthquake has climbed past 7,000.
National
police officer Babu Kanji Giri said Sunday that the death toll had
reached 7,040 as more bodies are found in the debris.
The Home Ministry said that 14,123 people were injured in the April 25 quake. Of them, 6,512 are being treated in hospitals.
- Binaj Gurubacharya, Kathmandu, Nepal.
---
9:30 p.m. (1545 GMT)
Nepal's
Home Ministry official Laxmi Dhakal says hopes of finding any more
survivors are fading away as more than a week has passed since the
massive earthquake.
He says: "Unless they were caught in an air pocket, there is not much possibility."
Two survivors - a 15-year-old boy and a woman in her 20s - were rescued from the rubble on Thursday.
- Binaj Gurubacharya, Kathmandu, Nepal.
---
9 p.m. (1515 GMT)
Dozens
of Nepalese have gathered in central Kathmandu's Maitighar Mandala Park
to recite a prayer and light candles for those who perished in the
earthquake.
A woman cried, a boy said a prayer
and others placed candles on the ground to form a map of Nepal, wishing
that victims can be united to overcome their grief.
Nila Shrestha, a 31-year-old Kathmandu resident, appealed to the world to continue sending aid to Nepal.
- Koji Ueda, Kathmandu, Nepal
---
6:10 p.m. (1225 GMT)
Nepal
police say the death toll from last week's magnitude-7.8 earthquake has
climbed to 6,841, as more reports come in from remote areas and rescue
workers dig out more bodies from under the rubble.
More than 14,000 people have been reported injured.
- Binaj Gurubacharya, Kathmandu, Nepal.
---
5:50 p.m. (1205 GMT)
In
Kathmandu, hundreds of volunteers have turned out to help those who
have been left homeless by the magnitude-7.8 quake a week ago.
They
have collected clothes, medicines, packaged food and money and are
distributing it at the Bhrikutimandap, an exhibition ground in the city.
Doctors,
engineers, business executives and office workers folded donated
clothes and packed medicines to be sent across neighborhoods.
"We
are gathering whatever we can. Our priority is providing medicines and
clean drinking water and warn people about the possibility of spread of
disease," said a visibly exhausted Srijana Jyoti, a businesswoman.
Jyoti said they have been shipping out water storage tanks to those in need.
"Water
is the essential and we are trying to get them access to clean drinking
water," she said, adding they are printing banners in the local
language telling what precautions to take to avoid getting sick.
- Binaj Gurubacharya, Kathmandu, Nepal.
---
5 p.m. (1130 GMT)
UNICEF
says the health and well-being of children affected by the earthquake
are hanging in the balance - many are homeless, in deep shock and with
no access to basic care.
There is also worry about the monsoon season and the risk of diseases like cholera and diarrheal infections.
With
about 40 percent of children stunted in Nepal, UNICEF is raising alarm
about the effect of the earthquake on their nutrition. It says that at
least 15,000 children with severe acute malnutrition require therapeutic
feeding.
There is also an urgent need for
children in the 12 most affected districts to get back to their normal
routine by setting up child-friendly spaces, opening schools and
providing access to basic services, such as health and water.
---
1:15 p.m. (0730 GMT)
A
week after a massive earthquake shook Nepal, angry villagers in some
parts of central Sindhupalchok district say they're still waiting for
aid to reach them.
In Pauwathok, three trucks
sped by without stopping Saturday. One of the trucks had police with
automatic weapons, escorting the two others, which were covered by
tarps.
"What about us?" screamed the
villagers. But the trucks sped off without halting. Of the 85 homes in
Pauwathok, all but a handful were destroyed in the magnitude-78 quake
that struck April 25.
"Nobody has come here to help us. No government, no police, no aid," said 71-year-old Badri Giri.
The
villagers said they were barely eating once a day, surviving with
whatever they could forage from the debris of their collapsed homes.
"We have no homes, no place to live anymore. We are sleeping outside," Giri said.
The UK has given £5m to help people affected by the earthquake in Nepal, which has killed at least 2,500 people.
The government said it had released £3m to address immediate needs and £2m would be given to the Red Cross.
Prime Minister David Cameron tweeted that a UK search and rescue team would be travelling to Nepal on Sunday night with RAF aircraft being sent on Monday.
A number of Britons have been caught up in Saturday's earthquake and the powerful aftershock felt on Sunday.
At least 17 people have been killed in avalanches on Mount Everest.
Climbers
and their guides have been cut off from Everest's devastated base camp,
unable to come down because climbing ropes and ladders have been swept
away.
Rescuers told the BBC the mountaineers were waiting to be rescued by helicopter but bad weather had hampered efforts.
The exact number of stranded mountaineers is not known but the
Nepalese government said more than 50 climbers had been rescued.
The
earthquake struck in the midst of the spring season in Nepal, when most
of the attempts to climb mountains in the region are made.
Foreign
Secretary Philip Hammond said "we would expect there to be several
hundred British nationals in Nepal" but there are currently no reports
of any killed or injured.
"British embassy staff have helped over 200 British nationals who've presented at the embassy directly," he said.
The
Foreign Office (FCO) has released an emergency number +44 (0) 207 008
0000 for people worried about loved ones who may have been in the area
at the time.
'Swaying streets'
A
British couple on their honeymoon are among a number of Britons caught
up in the earthquake and subsequent avalanches in the Everest area.
The exact number of stranded mountaineers is not known but the
Nepalese government said more than 50 climbers had been rescued.
The
earthquake struck in the midst of the spring season in Nepal, when most
of the attempts to climb mountains in the region are made.
Foreign
Secretary Philip Hammond said "we would expect there to be several
hundred British nationals in Nepal" but there are currently no reports
of any killed or injured.
"British embassy staff have helped over 200 British nationals who've presented at the embassy directly," he said.
The
Foreign Office (FCO) has released an emergency number +44 (0) 207 008
0000 for people worried about loved ones who may have been in the area
at the time.
'Swaying streets'
A
British couple on their honeymoon are among a number of Britons caught
up in the earthquake and subsequent avalanches in the Everest area.
Alex Schneider and Sam Chappatte, who are safe but cut off at a Mt Everest camp, described seeing an "avalanche coming straight" at them.
Alex
Staniforth, 19, from Chester, who is also stranded at camp one, texted
via satellite phone on Sunday to say his team will spend another night
there because "the weather has drawn in making helicopter entry
dangerous".
Tom Elphinstone and Zara Carey, both 26 and from
London, had been hiking the Annapurna circuit in western Nepal and were
in the town of Tansen when the earthquake hit.
They have told
family members of "swaying streets" and being in a building which moved
"like a ship" with "plaster falling off the walls".
Tanya Barron, from Plan International, has told the BBC of the scenes
she has encountered while travelling through the more remote areas of
the region.
She said that although Kathmandu was in an "area of
devastation and massive need" the remote mountainous villages were
"almost without any support".
She added: "The government is doing
a good job but nevertheless I have just driven past families sitting in
the middle of the rubble of their homes trying to make little
tarpaulins with small children.
"There was an aftershock of 6.7...
which is a pretty big earthquake on a normal day. Many more houses were
brought down so now as we travel through the countryside we see
thousands of people camping out on hill sides with very little shelter."
Meanwhile, an earthquake consultant working for the UK government says Nepal was unprepared for an earthquake of this scale.
Jon
Bennett, from Oxford Development Consultants, had travelled to Nepal
two weeks ago on behalf of the UK government, to assess how ready the
country was for an earthquake.
He told BBC Radio 5 live: "We knew,
when we were looking at the situation out there, that if there was
going to be a very large earthquake like this, the level of the
preparedness in the country was nowhere near sufficient to cope with the
kind of events that were likely to unfold, as indeed has been the
case."
Tent cities have sprung up for those
displaced by the earthquake in Nepal, which is now reported to have
killed some 2,500 people.
Many residents of the capital, Kathmandu, lost their homes as a result of the tremor.
And others are afraid to return to their homes - especially after strong aftershocks hit the region on Sunday.
It is thought hundreds of thousands of people in central Nepal have been spending a second night outdoors.
The tremor also unleashed avalanches on Mount Everest, which killed at least 17 people and injured 61 others.
Efforts to dig victims out from under the rubble of collapsed buildings in Kathmandu have been continuing.
Rescue
missions and aid have started arriving to help cope with the aftermath
of the worst earthquake to hit Nepal for more than 80 years.
The situation is still unclear in remote areas which remain cut off or hard to access.
The 7.8-magnitude quake struck an area of central Nepal between Kathmandu and the city of Pokhara early on Saturday.
Renewed panic
A powerful aftershock was felt on Sunday in Nepal, India and Bangladesh, and more avalanches were reported near Everest.
The 6.7-magnitude tremor, centred 60km (40 miles) east of Kathmandu, sent people running in panic for open ground in the city.
It brought down some houses that had been damaged in the initial quake.
The Nepali Times said that some people who had ventured back to their homes had decided to spend another night in tents.
People were using any available open spaces, it said, including school playgrounds and courtyards, and even traffic islands.
At hospitals rattled by the aftershocks, staff moved sick and injured patients outside.
Doctors at Kathmandu Medical College set up an operating theatre inside a tent, Reuters news agency said.
"Both
private and government hospitals have run out of space and are treating
patients outside, in the open," Nepal's envoy to India, Deep Kumar
Upadhyay, was quoted as saying.
"We have launched a massive rescue and rehabilitation action plan and
lots needs to be done," Nepal's Information and Broadcasting Minister
Minendra Rijal said.
"Our country is in a moment of crisis and we will require tremendous support and aid."
Mr Rijal said helicopters were being used to get teams into remote areas to get a better picture of casualties.
The official response was becoming more of a relief operation than a rescue mission, he said.
Offers
of help have come in from around the world. Some foreign teams have
already arrived and are helping with search and rescue efforts.
The
UN children's agency says nearly one million children in Nepal urgently
need humanitarian assistance as they were particularly vulnerable.
Heavy rain has further worsened conditions.
Offers of aid:
US: Disaster response team and an initial $1m (£0.7m), according to aid agency USAid
China: Rescue team reported to have arrived in Nepal
India: Several aircraft, carrying medical supplies and a
mobile hospital, and a 40-strong disaster response team, including
rescuers with dogs
UK: Eight-strong humanitarian team, £5m in aid
Pakistan: Four C-130 aircraft carrying a 30-bed field
hospital, and army doctors and specialists; urban search-and-rescue
teams equipped with radars and sniffer dogs; food items, including 2,000
meals, 200 tents and 600 blankets
Norway: $3.9m (£2.5m) in humanitarian assistance
Pledges from Germany, Spain, France, Israel and the EU
'Rubble and landslides'
Nepalese
officials have warned that the number of casualties could rise as
rescue teams reach remote mountainous areas of western Nepal.
Eyewitness reports suggest that some mountain villages may have been virtually destroyed.
A man evacuated by helicopter to Pokhara, 200 km from Kathmandu, said
almost every home in his village of more than 1,000 houses had been
destroyed, charity worker Matt Darvas of World Vision told the BBC.
In
Dhading district, 80 km west of Kathmandu, people were camped in the
open, the hospital was overflowing, the power was off and shops were
closed, Reuters news agency reported.
British Red Cross spokeswoman Penny Sims said it was hard to get an accurate picture of what is going on.
"A
lot of the roads are blocked, there's rubble, there's been landslides
as well... So that is going to make the aid effort very difficult," she
told the BBC.
Foreign climbers and their Nepalese guides around Mt Everest were
caught by the tremors and a huge avalanche that buried part of the base
camp in snow.
Pemba Sherpa, who was among the first group of
survivors were flown to Kathmandu on Sunday, said he was resting in his
tent when the quake hit.
"I heard a big noise and the next thing I
know I was swept away by the snow. I must have been swept almost 200
metres. I lost consciousness," he told AP news agency.
He said many people are still missing on the mountain as several tents were buried by the snow or blown away.
Separately
rescue workers have told the BBC that climbers stranded on Everest have
been unable to get down because climbing ropes and ladders have been
swept away by a series of avalanches.
Tourism Minister Deepak Chanda Amatya told the BBC that more than 50 climbers had been rescued.
Rescue efforts in Nepal are
intensifying after more than 1,300 people were killed in the country's
worst earthquake in more than 80 years.
Many countries and international charities have offered aid to Nepal to deal with the disaster.
Thousands of people braved freezing temperatures to sleep on pavements, parks or fields on Saturday night.
Officials fear that the death toll could rise as the desperate search for survivors continued into Sunday.
The
7.8 magnitude quake struck an area of central Nepal between the
capital, Kathmandu, and the city of Pokhara on Saturday morning.
There
were also victims in India, Bangladesh, in the Chinese region of Tibet
and on Mount Everest, where avalanches were triggered.
Little
information has emerged from the epicentre, where extensive damage has
been reported, and there are fears the death toll could rise yet
further.
It is the worst earthquake to strike Nepal since one in 1934 which killed some 8,500 people.
'Moment of crisis'
"We
have launched a massive rescue and rehabilitation action plan and lots
needs to be done," Information and Broadcasting Minister Minendra Rijal
told Indian television.
"Our country is in a moment of crisis and we will require tremendous support and aid."
World
leaders and global charities have offered emergency aid to Nepal, as
the government grapples with the scale of the disaster.
Its task
is made harder because internet and mobile phone communications are
erratic, with many roads closed due to quake damage.
The United States, China, Pakistan and European Union countries are among those who have pledged aid.
The
US Embassy in Nepal pledged $1m (£660,000) in initial aid while the US
Agency for International Development sent an urban search and rescue
team.
"We are working closely with the government of Nepal to provide assistance and support,'' said Secretary of State John Kerry.
China on Sunday dispatched a 62-member search and rescue team.
A number
of international charities including Red Cross, Oxfam, Doctors Without
Borders and Christian Aid are also sending teams to quake-hit areas.
"We do not yet know the scope of the damage, but this could be one of
the deadliest and most devastating earthquakes since the 1934 tremor
which devastated Nepal and [the Indian state of] Bihar," said
International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies
(IFRC) Asia-Pacific Director Jagan Chapagain.
The IFRC said it was
especially worried about the fate of villages near the epicentre of the
quake, some 80km (50 miles) from the capital Kathmandu.
In Europe, Britain, Germany and Spain pledged assistance, with Norway pledging $3.9m in humanitarian aid.
"The
absolute priority must be to reach people who are trapped and injured,
and provide shelter and protection to those who have lost their homes,"
UK International Development Secretary Justine Greening said.
Foreign
climbers and their Nepalese guides around Mount Everest were caught by
the tremors and a huge avalanche. Some took to social media to send
desperate messages for assistance, warning that otherwise more people
would die.
'Chaos'
An
official with Nepal's mountaineering department, Gyanendra Shrestha,
said the bodies of 10 people had been found while an unknown number of
climbers were missing or injured.
Their nationalities were unclear as climbers told of chaotic attempts
to treat the injured amid fears of more landslides and aftershocks.
Chinese media reported that a Chinese climber and two Sherpa guides were among the dead.
Dan Fredinburg, a Google executive who described himself as an adventurer, was also killed, Google confirmed.
Offers of aid:
The US is sending a disaster response team and has released an initial $1m (£0.7m) according to the US aid agency USAid
India has sent several aircraft,
carrying medical supplies and a mobile hospital, as well as a 40-strong
disaster response team, including rescuers with dogs
The UK is sending an eight-strong team of humanitarian experts
Pakistan is sending four C-130
aircraft carrying a 30-bed field hospital and army doctors and
specialists; urban search-and-rescue teams equipped with radars and
sniffer dogs; and food items, including 2,000 meals, 200 tents and 600
blankets
Norway has promised 30 million krone (£2.5m; $3.9m) in humanitarian assistance
Germany, Spain, France, Israel and the European Union are also pledging to send aid
World's deadliest recent earthquakes
Iran, 2003: More than 26,000 people killed in 6.6 earthquake near the city of Bam
Indonesia, 2004: Devastating 9.1 earthquake and ensuing
tsunami off the Sumatran province of Aceh kills more than 230,000
people in a dozen countries
Pakistani-administered Kashmir, 2005: 7.6 earthquake near Muzafferabad kills about 100,000 people
China, 2008: Nearly 90,000 killed in 7.9 earthquake in eastern Sichuan province
Haiti, 2010: More than 220,000 people killed in 7.0 magnitude earthquake
