Otto Perez Molina declared a national alert and advised people to evacuate¹ tall buildings as a precaution.

 

Officials said landslides² had buried roads and it would take 24 hours to restore links to the quake-hit area.

 

Frightened people fled from offices and homes around the region, as buildings shook from Mexico City to San Salvador.

 

The energy ministry³ said about 73,000 people have been left without electricity.

 

Quake officials said the tremor⁴ hit at about 10:35 local time (16:35 GMT) about 23km (15 miles) from the Guatemalan town of Champerico.

 

 

The director of Guatemala's Seismological Institute, Eddy⁵ Sanchez, said it had been the biggest tremor in Guatemala since 1976, when 25,000 people died in 7.5-magnitude quake.

 

There have been dozens of aftershocks to Wednesday's quake, four of them over a magnitude of 5.

 

President Perez Molina has given several news conferences, each time raising the number of casualties.

 

Touring the affected⁶ area, he said 40 deaths had been confirmed in San Marcos province and another eight in neighbouring Quetzaltenango.

 

He said many more people were still missing and 153 were being housed in emergency shelters.

 

Speaking in the town of San Marcos, he said: "It's very sad to meet people here who are waiting to find their families who are still buried.

 

"It's really a tragedy and we will do all we can to help the families that are suffering."

 

The national voluntary fire service gave details on its Twitter feed of the damage across the San Marcos region, describing how firefighters had pulled five bodies from the rubble⁷, including that of an 11-year-old boy.

 

In the town of San Cristobal Cucho, 10 members of one family were killed when their house collapsed⁸.

 

Fourteen houses have been destroyed in the city of Quetzaltenango, which houses dozens of language schools popular with tourists.

 

The US Pacific Tsunami⁹ Warning Center said in a statement there was no threat of a destructive widespread tsunami.

 

But it added: "Earthquakes of this size sometimes generate local tsunamis¹⁰ that can be destructive along coasts located within a hundred kilometres of the earthquake epicentre."

 

Panama, El Salvador and Honduras have offered their help with the rescue operation.

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