Residents in mountain communities 85 miles east of Rome woke up on Wednesday to scenes of devastation after a strong shallow earthquake rocked them at 3:30am. At the time of writing, the death toll has reached 267 and could rise further as rescue teams search for survivors under the rubble of flattened towns. Hundreds of homes have been destroyed. Trucks full of debris leave the areas every few minutes. People are frightened, sleeping in cars or tents with the earth continuing to tremble under them from aftershocks, hundreds of which have struck since the quake. Two of them registered 5.1 and 5.4, just before dawn. ‘I haven't slept much because I was really afraid,’ said 70-year-old Arturo Onesi from the town of Arquata del Tronto, who spent the night in a tent camp for survivors and rescue workers. Also on Wednesday, a 6.8 magnitude earthquake hit Myanmar. See