Nick Marsh
Reporting from Bangkok

What was supposed to be a new government office is now a mountain of debris, under which dozens of workers remain trapped.

Rescue workers have been here for hours, desperately searching for any signs of life. Their task is huge.

First they had to remove the enormous metal girders that had held the building up, then they began the painstaking process of combing through the rubble.

No matter what they find, tragedy has come to Thailand - more than a thousand kilometres from the epicentre of the earthquake.

We've been collecting testimonies from across Myanmar and Thailand today from people affected by the 7.7 magnitude earthquake that struck this morning.

One man tells the BBC he rushed into a Bangkok hospital to help evacuate patients:

Esme Stallard
Climate and science reporter

Image source, EPA

The top layer of the earth is split into different plates. We have a good idea of where these boundaries are and also where there are faults - cracks in the rock - created by the movement of these plates.

Geologists have built up this picture through studying previous earthquakes and looking for clues in the rock. They understand that friction gets built up between the plates as they move, and it can get released as a surge of energy which is felt as an earthquake.

What they do not know is when that energy may get released. This makes it very difficult for emergency planning.

For those countries that close to fault zones or the boundaries of plates, buildings and infrastructure can be constructed to withstand shaking of the ground. This is common on the western coast of the US and in Japan.

However, when there are particularly big earthquakes the impact can be felt much further away in countries that have not prepared for earthquakes and would not generally consider themselves at risk. This is what we have seen in Thailand and may explain why we have seen buildings collapse.

You may have heard of the use of early warning systems, but these are only used for secondary effects like tsunamis or in the case of earthquakes triggered by volcanic eruptions. In this case there are sometimes warning signs that an eruption is imminent, for example the release of gases.

You can read more about predicting earthquakes, and why they are usually wrong.

It's the early hours of the morning in both Thailand and Myanmar - and rescue operations are continuing.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Robb Falls

A man from Bangor in Northern Ireland has described how he had to evacuate children from their primary school as tremors from the Myanmar earthquake struck in Bangkok.

Robb Falls, who works at a school, managed to escape unharmed. He says the classroom "started spinning and wobbling" when the earthquake hit on Friday.

"It was a bit mad really... the blinds were shaking, I didn't really understand what was going on," he tells BBC News NI.

"It was hard to stay steady on your feet to get the kids out to safety."

Some of the pupils were quite upset, he says, meaning Falls had to "act quite cool" and "play it down" as he escorted them from the school building.

You can continue reading in our news story.

Amnesty International's deputy director of East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific has raised concerns about aid reaching residents in areas of Myanmar where the armed resistance has been fighting with the military.

"The military has a history of denying aid to areas where groups who resisted are active," Montse Ferrer tells the BBC.

"They have politicised aid since the coup of February 2021" she adds. "We fear this will continue."

Ferrer says further concerns lie around those belonging to vulnerable communities including older people and women and children. She also cites specifically ethnic groups - who she says have "suffered for decades from military rule".

• Earlier in the day, we reported on calls from Myanmar's opposition National Unity Government (NUG) for international aid to be coordinated through independent channels

Image source, Getty Images

A spokesperson from Unicef says the impact of today's earthquake will be "devastating" for children living in Myanmar.

Trevor Clarke, Unicef's emergency advisor for the region, says Myanmar is "one of the most difficult places on the planet for children".

Today's earthquake, he says, "only compounds their dire situation".

Clarke says it's tough to get access to immediate information on the ground in Myanmar, but the organisation will "see just how bad it is in the next few days".

In the meantime, Unicef is bringing supplies from overseas - including tents, trampolines, mats, and hygiene kits to meet what he has described as the "basic needs of children".

Image source, Getty Images

It's well into the middle of the night in both Myanmar and Thailand - where flood lights and drones were being used to provide light for continued rescue operations as darkness fell.

The focus of our coverage over the last few hours has been on those ongoing rescue efforts in both countries as many remain unaccounted for.

To catch you up to speed, here's the latest:

• Two buildings have been evacuated overnight in Bangkok, the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration has said, with over 2,000 more due to be inspected by volunteers tomorrow
• It follows the collapse of an unfinished high-rise which has left six dead and around 100 more as yet unaccounted for - according to local officials
• Rescue workers have been aided by drones and sniffer dogs in a bid to find those who are missing - floodlights have enabled the search to continue into the night
• In Myanmar, the death toll currently stands at 144 - with hundreds more injured, an army official has said
• Aid workers have highlighted the challenges with reaching people. Doctors Without Borders has said there are "significant communication blackouts in some of the hardest hit areas"

Our coverage will be continuing over the coming hours and we'll closely be watching for developments in Myanmar and Bangkok.

For now - if you'd like to hear more from those on the ground we previously spoke with a member of a rescue team working around Mandalay, a health worker in Myanmar's capital Nay Pyi Taw, and one of our own reporters in Thailand.

A woman gave birth to a baby on a street in Bangkok shortly after a hospital evacuation following tremors from an earthquake in neighbouring Myanmar.

The patient was lying on a stretcher as hospital staff surrounded her and delivered the baby.

Patients from both King Chulalongkorn Memorial Hospital and BNH Hospital were gathered in a park, some of them were in stretchers and wheelchairs.

Hospital staff were also seen attending to patients outside of the hospitals.

We're just now hearing from the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration that two buildings in the city have evacuated people this evening as of 19:00 GMT (01:30 local time).

Over 2,000 cases have also been reported for inspection - with the Administration saying 100 volunteer engineers will check on these buildings tomorrow.

Tessa Wong
Reporting from Bangkok

Rescue work at the Bangkok building collapse site has been slow given the immense scale of damage.

I've just spoken to some rescue workers who have been here all day. They confirmed that they only pulled out five bodies, and these were all found just outside of the collapsed building.

This means they have yet to find anyone from underneath the debris, even after hours of rescue work and preparation.

Scores of construction workers remain unaccounted for. As we've been reporting, the latest estimate by local government is around 100.

It is now about 12 hours since the earthquake first struck, and the window to find survivors is decreasing.

• Footage from earlier shows the moment the tower, under construction, came down in the Chatuchak neighbourhood.

Ko Ko Aung
BBC World Service

Image source, Getty Images

I've been speaking to a health worker in Myanmar's capital Nay Pyi Taw, who was in a nearby village providing medical care when the earthquake struck.

She says the house she was in "started shaking very violently", adding that "we didn't have time to run, we wouldn't escape if we ran, it was so shaky that we couldn't run".

The 60-year-old tells BBC News she went outside and away from buildings and sat in a field, adding that this was the "only time I experienced this severe" earthquake.

Elsewhere within the Nay Pyi Taw area, a rescue worker says they went to a house where someone was trapped inside but it "was not possible to take them out".

The 35-year-old tells BBC News that they later carried out two bodies from a goldsmith's shop and one who was alive but in a "critical condition". People in charge of the shop told them 17 people were still trapped, they said.

"We can only find people where we can hear them."

Aid organisation Doctors Without Borders says the situation is "complicated" in Myanmar because there are "significant communication blackouts in some of the hardest hit areas".

Its head of mission in Myanmar, Federica Franco, says this is because of the "ongoing conflict" in the country - referring to the civil war.

She says "key roads" have been damaged, which is "making it incredibly challenging, not just to get information, but also to reach physically those people that are urgently in need of help".

"Time is particularly critical in situations like these, especially for those who need immediate care," she adds.

Tessa Wong
Reporting from Bangkok

Some more now from the scene of the collapsed high-rise building in Bangkok, which was still under construction.

More than 400 workers reported for work earlier today at the building site for the headquarters of Thailand's auditor general's office - but only about 300 have emerged.

At least six workers have been found dead already, local government says, while scores remain missing - the current estimate is around 100.

Though officials have yet to confirm this, it is widely believed that some of the missing workers are Burmese.

The Burmese have been a staple of Thailand's migrant workforce, as many have long sought work in the wealthier neighbouring country.

But since the Myanmar civil war began, their numbers have swelled to more than two million - many of them work in the construction sector.

Tessa Wong
Reporting from Bangkok

Rescue workers are gathered at the base of the collapsed, unfinished tower, while several drones hover above, their lights blinking as they scan the scene.

One drone is tethered at the centre of the site, but others are sweeping over the huge pile of debris, occasionally flying in close or entering the empty, towering structures still standing around the collapse.

They seem to be checking how bad the damage is and searching for any signs of life.

A group of sniffer dogs has just been brought in. Further into the site, we can see large diggers, drilling machines and tents, all lit up by powerful floodlights.

Bui Thu
BBC Bangkok

Image source, Reuters

Getting around Bangkok is becoming harder by the hour.

Most major public transport systems, including the popular SkyTrain and subway, have shut down.

Only buses are still running.

Traffic on the roads is badly congested, and many people are stuck in their offices with no way to get home.

Outside train stations, long queues have formed as people wait for services to start running again.

Booking a car or motorbike through a ride-sharing app is almost impossible. Prices have surged up to four times higher – if you can even find a ride.

Image source, Bui Thu/BBC

Tessa Wong
Reporting from Bangkok

It's just gone past midnight in Bangkok and the site of the unfinished skyscraper collapse is still buzzing with frantic activity.

Hundreds of rescue workers wearing hard hats are rushing around while the red and blue flashes of emergency vehicles light up the area.

Cranes and diggers have been brought in, but the mountain of debris is absolutely enormous and at least 10 storeys tall, dwarfing the rescue workers below.

The building - the new headquarters for the auditor general's office - is situated just across from one of Bangkok's most popular tourist attractions, Chatuchak market.

The area has been cordoned off but that hasn't stopped members of the public and tourists coming in to watch the rescue.

Cachella Smith
Live reporter

A spokesperson for the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, in Myanmar says the organisation is still trying to understand the full extent of the earthquake damage, but is ready to provide help – including shelter and household items – "as soon as safe routes to Mandalay are secured".

Diogo Alcantara, who is based in Yangon in the south of the country, tells me that around 1.6 million people displaced by ongoing conflict are living in central and north-western Myanmar, and today's disaster will "no doubt exacerbate [their] hardships".

"This disaster, combined with an intensified armed conflict in a country that is vulnerable to climate change, makes civilians pay an immense price."

"And this growing humanitarian assistance comes at a moment of shrinking funding, putting the humanitarian organisations, including UNHCR, in a hard-to-impossible exercise of prioritisation."

BBC Burmese Service, Bangkok

I was in my apartment in Bangkok when I felt the earthquake earlier. A lightbulb fell and there were cracks forming on the wall.

I ran down to the ground floor as fast as I could - it was only then that I heard a severe earthquake had hit my home in Myanmar, hundreds of miles away.

I tried frantically to call home but couldn’t connect for a long while.

Soon I heard that the epicentre was near Mandalay, where I have family and friends. So I tried calling them, but it was tough getting through. After some time, I finally got a chance to talk to someone - a Mandalay resident.

"The city is a complete mess and completely destroyed," he told me. Several buildings had collapsed on the road, lamp posts had been uprooted, he said. Sounds of sirens and ambulances and fire trucks covered the city.

The military junta in control of Myanmar has announced a state of emergency in Mandalay, Sagaing, Magway, NorthEastern Shan, and Bago regions.

They’re also continuing to ask for urgent blood donations.

Image source, BBC Burmese Service

Peter Gillibrand
BBC Newsbeat

Second-year student Myat Hsu Paing has been desperately trying to contact her friends and family in Myanmar since news of the earthquake broke.

"I reached out to my mum and she didn’t pick up the first two calls," the UK's Aston University student tells BBC Newsbeat.

She’s since confirmed her family in Taungdwingy, south of the epicentre near Sagaing, are safe – but she still hasn’t heard from a friend who lives closer to where the 7.7 magnitude quake hit.

“Every minute I’m checking my phone in case I’ve got a message from her,” Myat says. “I feel really worried.”

She says military rule in Myanmar is making it even harder to get in touch.

“Sometimes there’s no electricity, no internet, so I can’t reach my friends, my family. It’s frustrating you don’t know what’s going on their side – especially in serious situations.

“Just reaching out is everything I can do. I just want to know if they’re safe.”

Image source, Getty Images