ROME: Some 500 persons have been killed in Sicily in the worst European earthquake since Skopje, Yugoslavia, disaster in 1963, the Italian news agency, `Italia`, said today [Jan 15]. It was considered lil(ely that the death toll would rise as haggard rescue-workers digging through the ruins of towns and villages in Western Sicily found more bodies under the debris.

Four quakes rocked the triangle formed by Palermo, Trapani and Castelvetrano in the southwest part of the island, knocking down buildings, disrupting communications and causing people to flee in panic.

An officlal who was among the first to reach the town of Poggioreale on foot said it was almost completely wiped out. In the town of Salemi about 500 houses collapsed one-fourth of the town.

The air in the area was heavy with the odour of sulphur filtering out of fissures in the mountains.

Officials said more than 1,000 houses have been totally or partly destroyed over a wide area in Trapani province, one of the loveliest and most accessible regions in Sicily.

Mountain villages lay in rubble as though bombed. Heavy snow and freezing weather slowed rescue columns moving along winding mountain roads. Agency