CONCEPCION, Chile - Aftershocks rattled south-central Chile on Friday, panicking residents seven days after one of the strongest earthquakes on record ravaged the area, and the government said it was revising faulty death toll figures.
Some people ran out of their houses, or jumped out of the vehicles they have been sleeping in since their homes were destroyed, as seven intense tremors hit the city of Concepcion on Friday morning.
One of the aftershocks was a strong magnitude 6.6.
"Some chunks of buildings that were already in bad condition fell, but nothing significant," the top government official in quake-hit Bio Bio region told local radio.
Saturday's 8.8-magnitude earthquake, and a series of giant waves that followed, destroyed hundreds of thousands of homes, wrecked bridges and roads, and cracked modern buildings in half in the capital of Santiago. It also wreaked havoc in Chile's famous vineyards and briefly shut down some of the world's richest copper mines.
The Chilean navy said there was no risk of tsunamis from the new aftershocks and people did not stray too far into the streets of Concepcion since the army has imposed a curfew until mid-day to control sporadic looting.
"It was terrible," said a scared older man outside his house. "The three aftershocks that we just felt were very strong, I don't know when this is going to end."
The government said on Thursday the death toll, previously reported as 802, was unclear due to confusion over who was missing. Officials said they had identified 279 dead people, but were not sure how many bodies were unidentified.
Then on Friday, Chile's two major newspapers said the government also revised down its calculation of fatalities in the hard-hit Maule region to 316 from a previous 587.
In an blog posted on the daily El Mercurio website, the former head of the emergency services office Alberto Maturana called the muddled numbers "a comedy of errors."
"The (emergency services) agency has no validity in public opinion, when it is supposed to be the most credible," Maturana was quoted as saying.
The government was already under fire for being slow to ship aid to the region, for underestimating damages at first, and for failing to properly alert coastal towns of a tsunami.
In Concepcion, looting was mostly under control after the quake as hundreds of troops patrolled the streets and handed out food aid. Long lines formed at one of the few grocery stores in town finally opened to customers.
But near Concepcion in the port town of Talcahuano, which was battered by walls of waves after the quake, looters rummaged through a factory and a retail store on Thursday.
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon was expected to tour Concepcion and other badly hit towns and meet with President Michelle Bachelet and President-elect Sebastian Pinera, set to take office next week.
As more information comes out about the extent of damages in the world's top copper producer and one of Latin America's most stable countries, analysts say the economy could bounce back from losses in the second half of the year as money flows in for the reconstruction.
Bachelet said the new government will need to tap international lenders for money to rebuild.
Ratings agency Standard and Poor's has said the quake would have no immediate effect on Chile's credit quality
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