A magnitude 5.8 earthquake shook Mexico on Thursday, causing buildings to sway in the capital some 300 kilometers (187 miles) away from the epicenter, an AFP correspondent and US seismologists said.

The quake struck at 1324 GMT near the town of Ometepec in the state of Guerrero, at a depth of 10 kilometers (six miles), the US Geological Survey (USGS) said.

The tremor rattled Mexico City, where earthquake alarms rang out in some quarters and office workers briefly spilled onto the streets.

Helicopters patrolled the capital — whose metropolitan area has a population of about 21 million people — while civil protection authorities reported no immediate damages.

[Continues at AlterNet]

An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.8 has hit northeastern Burma, also known as Myanmar.

The quake struck at 8:25 p.m. local time Thursday near the Southeast Asian country’s borders with Thailand and Laos, about 110 kilometres from the northern Thai city of Chiang Rai.

Two earthquakes were initially reported with a 7.0 magnitude, but the U.S. Geological Survey soon amended its report to confirm one shallow quake, centred 10 kilometres below the surface of the earth.

“Overall, the population in this region resides in structures that are highly vulnerable to earthquake shaking, though some resistant structures exist,” said a report posted on the monitoring agency’s website shortly after the quakes. “The predominant vulnerable building types are wood and unreinforced brick masonry construction.”

The monitor said 600,000 people would have experienced shaking anywhere from strong to violent and moderate to very heavy damage is expected in homes.

[Continues at CBC News]

This crazy statistic comes from the Wall Street Journal’s Amy Chozick and Cecile Rohwedder, who discovered, as proof of the media madness that will be Prince William and Kate Middleton’s wedding, “CNN alone will have a team of roughly 400 reporters, cameramen and crew assigned to the wedding.” To compare: A group of just 50 CNN employees, one-eighth the size of the anticipated wedding fleet, are currently on the ground in Japan covering the aftermath of the earthquake and the continuing nuclear containment problem.

CNN isn’t the only network with such disproportionately big plans for the royal wedding. On the day of the earthquake, Technolayer reported that NBC News sent four anchors and correspondents to join the staff at its Tokyo Bureau. The same day, the Associated Press wrote that NBC was planning to send “an army of people–in the hundreds” to cover William and Kate’s nuptuals. ABC’s senior vice president wouldn’t confirm to the AP how much manpower it would have in London on the wedding day, but did say “it’s a major event that takes resources and people.” ABC sent three anchors and corespondents to Japan the day of the earthquake.

Tokyo, Japan

The rebuilding of a city has a price and the World Banks has come up with an estimate. New Zealand Herald reports:

Japan may need five years to rebuild from the earthquake and tsunami that has caused up to US$235 billion ($320 billion) of damage, says the World Bank.

The March 11 disaster will likely shave up to 0.5 of a percentage point from the country’s economic growth this year, the bank said in a report. The impact will be concentrated in the first half of the year.

“Damage to housing and infrastructure has been unprecedented,” the World Bank said. “Growth should pick up, though, in subsequent quarters as reconstruction efforts, which could last five years, accelerate.”

The bank cited damage estimates between US$123 billion and US$235 billion, and cost to private insurers of between US$14 billion and US$33 billion. It said the government will spend US$12 billion on reconstruction in the current national budget and “much more” in the next one.

[Continues at New Zealand Herald]