Earthquakes rattle Santorini, driving tourist exodus from Greece's volcanic island
CBSN
London — Tourists continued to flee the Greek island of Santorini on Wednesday — a fourth consecutive day of exodus sparked by a series of earthquakes that have rattled the incredibly popular European vacation destination. Around 7,000 people have left the island, which sits southeast of Greece's mainland, since the quakes began last week, according to the AFP news agency.
Most of the visitors have left Santorini by ferry, but there have also been flights out.
As of Tuesday, more than 1,000 earthquakes, with magnitudes up to 5.2 on the Richter scale, had been recorded near the island, most of them centered only about 15 miles from its shores in the Aegean Sea, according to the Euro-Mediterranean Seismological Centre.
Two top security officials at the U.S. Agency for International Development have been placed on administrative leave, the latest in a series of suspensions and layoffs at the American government's primary humanitarian aid agency.
A series of earthquakes near the Greek island of Santorini have led authorities to shut down schools, dispatch rescue teams with sniffer dogs and send instructions to residents including a request to drain their swimming pools.
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