Port Vila (Vanuatu) (AFP) - Rescue teams dug for survivors trapped beneath crumpled buildings in Vanuatu on Wednesday after a powerful earthquake struck the capital Port Vila, leaving at least 14 people reported dead.

People called out from beneath the rubble of one three-storey shop in the city, where scores of rescuers worked through the night to find them, resident Michael Thompson told AFP by satellite phone.

“We got three people out that were trapped. Unfortunately, one of them did not make it,” he said.

About 80 people including police, medics, trained rescuers and volunteers were using excavators, jackhammers, grinders and concrete saws, “just everything we can get our hands on”.

When rescuers on the site went quiet, they could still hear three people within signalling they were alive on Wednesday morning, Thompson said.

“There’s tonnes and tonnes of rubble on top of them. And two rather significant concrete beams that have pancaked down,” he said. “Obviously they are lucky to be in a bit of a void.”

The 7.3-magnitude quake struck off Vanuatu’s main island at 12:47 pm local time (0147 GMT) Tuesday.

It flattened large buildings, cracked walls and windows, knocked down bridges, and set off landslides in the low-lying archipelago of 320,000 people.

- ‘We could hear screams’ -

A string of aftershocks has since shaken the Pacific island nation, which lies in the quake-prone Pacific Rim of Fire.

Australia and New Zealand each said they planned to fly in medical and search-and-rescue teams on Wednesday to provide urgent assistance.

The earthquake knocked out most telecommunications networks. Airlines suspended flights citing reported damage to the runway. A landslide fell near the main international shipping port.

Katie Greenwood, head of the Red Cross in the Pacific, wrote on social media platform X that Vanuatu’s government had reported 14 confirmed fatalities and 200 injured people being treated at the capital’s main hospital.

The ground floor of a four-storey concrete block in Port Vila – used by the US, French, British, Australian and New Zealand diplomatic missions – was flattened, AFP photos showed.

US, French and Australian staff members who were inside are safe, the three countries have said.

Thompson, who runs a zipline adventure business in Vanuatu, said he had seen at least three bodies in the city.

Shortly after the quake, he drove near the airport past a toppled four-storey block. Its ground floor had collapsed under the upper stories.

“When we slowed down with the windows down, we could hear screams coming from inside,” he said.

The quake crushed four large buildings in Port Vila, triggered a landslide that covered a bus, and demolished at least two bridges, Thompson said.

- Broken glass, debris -

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs cited earlier unconfirmed reports of at least six dead and estimated 116,000 people could be affected by the worst impacts of the quake.

The hospital in Port Vila had been damaged, with tents set up outside for the influx of patients, it said, adding that there was also significant disruption to telecommunications and the two main water reservoirs had been damaged.

“Immediate response efforts are ongoing as humanitarian partners and authorities work to overcome access and communication challenges,” it said in a situation update.

Some people injured in the quake were driven in flat-bed trucks to the Port Vila hospital where others lay in stretchers outside or sat on plastic chairs, their arms and heads wrapped in bandages, public television VBTC images showed.

Video posted by Thompson and verified by AFP showed buildings that folded to the ground, and streets strewn with broken glass and other debris from the wreckage.

Vanuatu is ranked as one of the countries most susceptible to natural disasters such as earthquakes, storm damage, flooding and tsunamis, according to the annual World Risk Report.