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Napa Quake: More than 100 Injured, Damage Up To $1B

The 6.0-magnitude quake that hit Napa County, the center of California’s wine industry, left more than a hundred injured and up to $1-billion worth of damages to property and economy.

At least 120 people were reportedly injured, including three critical, as the quake knocked structures and objects, caused gas and water lines to burst, and sparked fires. It struck at around 3:20 a.m. on Sunday local time, awakening many sleeping Californians, the Associated Press reported.

More than 60,000 residents were left without power and at least three homes were destroyed by fire. But by midday, fires were out and power was starting to be restored, according to the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services’ Mark Ghilarducci.

[quote text_size=”small” author=”– Mark Ghilarducci” author_title=”California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services”]

While it was bad, it wasn’t as bad as it could be and it was very manageable from a regional perspective.

[/quote]

The tremor hit around 10 kilometers south of Napa and lasted around 10 to 20 seconds, depending on the location’s proximity to the epicenter. It was the strongest to hit the San Francisco Bay Area in 25 years since the 6.9-magnitude Loma Prieta quake that killed 62 people in 1989, according to the United States Geological Survey.

It was also widely felt throughout the region, with residents as far as the eastern Nevada border reported to feel the tremors.

The earthquake is estimated to have caused at $1 billion in damage and economic losses, TIME reported. The destruction is widely felt by vineyards and wineries: crops that  to be harvested were destroyed and thousands of wine bottles and barrels were broken.

California Governor Jerry Brown has already declared state of calamity on the affected areas, which includes the counties of Napa, Solano, and Sonoma.

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