World - AFP Algerian earthquake toll rises to more than 1,000, with hundreds missing Thu May 22, 7:57 PM ET ALGIERS (AFP) - Rescuers were frantically searching for survivors amid mountains of rubble after Algeria's worst earthquake (news - web sites) in more than two decades killed more than 1,000 people and injured thousands more. The powerful quake left a trail of widespread destruction in Algiers and several towns to the east of the capital. Provisional figures from the interior ministry put the death toll at 1,092, with 6,782 injured. Hundreds of residents of Algiers and nearby towns and villages could could not be accounted for. The worst loss of life was recorded in the Boumerdes administrative region, 50 kilometers (30 miles) east of Algiers, where 624 people died, and in the Algiers district where 457 people lost their lives. The toll is already the highest since the quake of 1980 which registered 7.5 on the open-ended Richter scale and killed 3,000 people. In small coastal town of Boumerdes, the spectacle of the destruction caused by the quake was particularly shocking: dozens of once imposing buildings flattened as if they had been hit by steam hammers. Armed with shovels and axes civil defence workers, conscripts, families of the missing and young volunteers appeared helpless when confronted with buildings that had collapsed in a matter of moments. Hopelessly under-equipped, they tried as best they could to pull survivors from the rubble. "We are here because our these are neighbours, our friends and we have to try everything," said a weary Ali, clawing at rubble and harbouring few illusions as to the outcome of his efforts. President Abdelaziz Bouteflika visited the Boumerdes region and has decreed three days of national mourning. The earthquake was registered at 7:44 pm local time (1844 GMT) Wednesday. Panic-stricken inhabitants of Algeria and the neighbouring department poured onto the streets. Thousands of others were buried in the rubble of collapsed apartment buildings and houses. The epicentre of the quake, recorded at 5.8 on the Richter scale, was located between Thenia and Zenmouri, according to the Algerian centre for astronomic and astrophysical research (CRAAG). The observatory at Strasbourg in eastern France registered the quake at 6.0, while US seismologists put it at 6.8. An expert at CRAAG tried unsuccessfully to reassure the stunned inhabitants of Algeria that aftershocks, which normally follow quakes and continue to be felt in Algiers, would weaken and then progressively disappear. The shock was felt on the Mediterranean coast of Spain, according to the country's national geographic (news - web sites) institute. No victims were recorded but 180 boats, trawlers, fishing vessels, tugs and pleasure craft were reported either sunk or damaged by surging waves caused by the quake. It also severed undersea cables, cutting telephone traffic between Europe and several countries in Asia, the Middle East and the Pacific. In Algeria many deaths were caused by falling bricks and masonry. In the immediate aftermath of the shock thousands abandoned their houses for the streets and crowded into parks and open spaces, far from buildings which were still standing but were being shaken by aftershocks. On a cool night women and children slept outside or in trucks, school playgrounds or public gardens. International aid has begun to arrive. Two French airforce planes each carrying a team of 60 civil rescue workers arrived Thursday. French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, who arrived Thursday afternoon, visited Rouiba, one of the towns affected, 20 kilometers (12 miles) east of Algiers. In Geneva, the International Red Cross and Red Crescent issued an appeal for 2.0 million Swiss francs (1.5 million dollars) for an operation by the Algerian Red Crescent to supply shelter and other emergency aid for at least 10,000 people. Algeria's neighbor Morocco said it would send a team of 45 rescue workers along with medicines and thousands of tents and blankets to help the homeless. Portugal also announced it would 30 rescue workers along with specially trained dogs to search for survivors in the rubble. Pope John Paul (news - web sites) II and many national leaders have sent messages of sympathy.