A pow­er­ful earth­quake rocked Myan­mar and neigh­bor­ing Thai­land on Fri­day, de­stroy­ing build­ings, a bridge and a dam. At least 144 peo­ple were killed in Myan­mar, where pho­tos and video from two hard-hit cities showed ex­ten­sive dam­age. At least eight died in the Thai cap­i­tal, where a high-rise un­der con­struc­tion col­lapsed.

The 7.7 mag­ni­tude quake, with an epi­cen­ter near Man­dalay, Myan­mar‘s sec­ond largest city, struck at mid­day and was fol­lowed by a strong 6.4 mag­ni­tude af­ter­shock.

The full ex­tent of death, in­jury and de­struc­tion was not im­me­di­ate­ly clear — par­tic­u­lar­ly in Myan­mar, one of the world’s poor­est coun­tries. It is em­broiled in a civ­il war and in­for­ma­tion is tight­ly con­trolled.