Rescue teams race to find survivors as death toll rises to 2,500 in Morocco

Rescuers are racing the clock to find survivors in the rubble more than 48 hours after Morocco’s deadliest earthquake in more than six decades.

Some 2,497 people were killed in a disaster that devastated villages in the High Atlas Mountains.

Aftershocks will continue to rock Morocco weeks or months, a seismological expert has warned.

Morocco’s King Mohammed VI has thanked Spain, Qatar, the United Kingdom and the United Arab Emirates for sending aid, with the UK government set to send 60 search and rescue specialists and four search dogs to Morocco.

The damage from the quake could take several years to repair, according to the Red Cross.