Russia quake leaves 2,000 homeless*

    * Story Highlights
    * More than 2,000 people left homeless after earthquake on Russian
island
    * Two people died in series of quakes on Sakhalin
    * Inspectors found 11 apartment buildings with 410 homes fully destroyed

MOSCOW, Russia (Reuters) -- More than 2,000 people have been left
homeless following an earthquake on Russia's Far Eastern island of
Sakhalin, the local governor told Russian media on Friday.

The series of three tremors on Thursday afternoon left two dead and at
least eight people injured. One of the quakes registered a magnitude of
6.4 on the Richter scale.

Inspectors found that at least 11 apartment buildings containing 410
homes were fully destroyed, the Sakhalin region's governor, Ivan
Malakhov, said. He said another 20 apartment buildings containing 710
homes need major renovations.

"It is either impossible or dangerous to live there before they are
repaired," the governor was quoted by Interfax as telling journalists in
Neveslk, the town badly hit by the quakes.

Railway cars will arrive late on Friday to accommodate 300 people from
the island's main town of Yuzno-Sakhalinsk, he said.

Four flights containing tents, radiators, food and blankets are being
dispatched to the island, the Russian Emergencies Situations Ministry
spokesman Viktor Beltsov told Interfax.

Sakhalin Energy said its operations were not affected by the quake.

Sakhalin Energy, which is made up of Gazprom, Royal Dutch Shell, Mitsui
and Mitsubishi, operates the Sakhalin-2 project

Exxon Mobil Corp's Sakhalin-1 oil and gas production facility suffered
no damage, the company stated on Thursday.

In 1995, the island was hit by Russia's worst recorded earthquake, which
killed 1,989 people from the town Neftegorsk