Turkey's windswept eastern Anatolian region is a land as shaky as it is harsh. Situated in the world's earth quake belt, the area was devastated by a 1939 shock that claimed 23,000 lives, and another in 1943 that killed 4,000. Lesser jolts occur with regularity. "Since 1946," reports one villager, "I have had to rebuild my house 18 times." Earlier this year, tremors twice rattled the town of Varto, causing 16 deaths. Last week terror struck again.
At 2:25 one afternoon, soon after farmers had returned from lunch to their wheatfields, they heard a gathering roar that sounded like rolling stones....
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