Hundreds of people slept outdoors overnight on the Portuguese island of Sao Miguel in the mid-Atlantic Azores archipelago following a wave of light to moderate earthquakes, emergency services officials said.
More than 200 quakes have been recorded on the island, the largest and most populated in the nine-island chain, since Tuesday causing some light damage to older buildings but no injuries.
The strongest quakes measured six on the 12-point Mercalli scale, which measures an earthquake's intensity, and were centred on the southern part of the island, seismologists on the Azores said.
The head of the firefighting department in the town of Vila Franca do Campo said some 200 people had chosen to sleep beside the fire station while hundreds more either slept outside their homes or in open fields outside urban areas.
Interior Minister Antonio Costa visited the island late on Tuesday and said the government was doing everything in its powers to ensure the safety of local residents.
The civil protection service on the island raised its alert level to orange, the second-highest level in the four-level alert system, in response to the earthquakes.
