MEXICALI, Mexico (Reuters) – Families huddled in parks and car parks in the northern Mexican border city of Mexicali yesterday after aftershocks from a big earthquake led them to sleep out in debris-strewn streets.

Two people died and around 100 were injured when a 7.2 magnitude quake rocked the Mexico-California border area on Sunday afternoon, Baja California Governor Jose Osuna told the Televisa television network. One person was crushed in a collapsed house, the other hit by a falling wall.

The tremor, felt as far north as Los Angeles, cracked main roads, toppled electricity posts and knocked down an empty multistorey car park under construction in Mexicali, a prosperous city and busy border crossing.

Hundreds of people camped out overnight as smaller tremors shook buildings with cracked floors, walls and broken windows.

“I wasn’t going to put my family at risk. Lots of homes have cracks,” said Fermin Garcia, a teacher who slept with her family in a tent pitched between two shopping centers.

Broken gas pipes sparked a number of fires on Sunday, and darkened streets in Mexicali triggered car accidents, but no major buildings appeared to have collapsed.

Power was slowly being reestablished yesterday, but many state-run hospitals lacked power and patients were laid out on beds in parking lots due to worries over cracked walls.