Tourists in Thailand could not believe their eyes as a powerful earthquake shook their hotel, triggering huge waves in an infinity pool as swimmers clung on to the wall in an attempt to ride out the violent tremors.

A British man is heard shouting ‘what the f**k’ as the water swells around a swimmer and across the floor of the rooftop sundeck.

The people in the pool are in a dangerous position as the waves become increasingly violent, with sunbeds abandoned as terrified holidaymakers moved away from the edge. 

More dramatic video shows a swimming pool atop a luxury apartment being shaken by the quake as a young family watches on in horror.

The family, said to be Korean tourists, take shelter indoors with their young child as huge waves slosh against the windows and over the ledge from the infinity pool.

Other footage shows water cascading from tall glass skyscrapers as they were rattled by the force of the quake.

The scale of the 7.7-magnitude earthquake which hit Myanmar and Thailand, and the destruction it has caused, has been laid bare in shocking footage of the disaster.

Multiple videos have circulated showing swimming pools atop high-rise buildings in Bangkok being emptied as the earthquake flung water out of them and down onto the street below.

Millions of people rushed to get out of buildings as the quake hit the Thai capital, with dramatic footage showing panicked locals and tourists screaming as they pushed past each other to get out of a shopping centre in the city.

The tremors forced the suspension of some metro and light rail services in the city, with video showing Bangkok’s famous Skytrain being violently rocked as commuters grip on to each other. 

A swimmer clings on for dear life as an infinity pool was turned into a wave pool by the tremors

Water washes over the sundeck as shocked tourists watch on

A British man is heard shouting ‘what the f**k’ as the water swells

Huge waves washed over the side of an infinity pool in Bangkok as the earthquake struck

Water cascades down from a rooftop swimming pool in Bangkok as the quake struck

Video shows Bangkok’s famous Skytrain being violently rocked as commuters grip on to each other

People sprinted to get to safety as the earthquake struck Bangkok

Dramatic footage showing panicked locals and tourists screaming as they pushed past each other to get out of a shopping centre

Shoppers poured out of the mall in Bangkok as the earthquake hit

More shocking video has shown the moment workers fled as a building under construction collapsed, killing at least three people and trapping 90 beneath the rubble, according to Thai authorities.

Defence Minister Phumtham Wechayachai offered no more details about the ongoing rescue efforts but first responders said that seven people had been rescued so far from outside the collapsed building.

Terrifying footage shows the moment workers ran for their lives from the building site as the apartment block collapses behind them, sending a huge cloud of dust and debris into the air.

The US Geological Survey and Germany’s GFZ centre for geosciences said the quake struck at a shallow 6.2 miles below the surface, before a second quake, with a magnitude of 6.4, shook the area 12 minutes later.

The force of the tremors caused a mosque in the city of Mandalay, close to the epicentre of the quake, to collapse, with at least ten worshippers said to have been killed.

Officials at a major hospital in Myanmar’s capital Naypyidaw have declared it a ‘mass casualty area’, with the death toll in the country expected to rise after buildings were toppled and debris was sent flying.

Large parts of neighbouring Thailand also felt the quake, with a state of emergency declared in the country’s capital, which is home to more than 17 million people, many of whom live in high-rise apartments.

Alarms went off in buildings as the earthquake hit around 1.30pm local time, and startled residents were evacuated down staircases of high-rise buildings and hotels in densely populated central Bangkok.

They remained in the streets, seeking shade from the midday sun in the minutes after the quake.

Workers were seen walking away from the building slowly when it began to topple as the tremors shook the Thai capital

Terrifying footage shows the moment an apartment block under construction collapsed in Bangkok

A huge cloud of dust erupted as the building collapsed to the ground, sending debris flying

Workers fled in terror as the building gave way after being shaken by the force of the quake

The quake was forceful enough to send water sloshing out of pools, some high above the street in high-rises, as the tremor shook

Rescuers work at the site of a collapsed building after the tremors of a strong earthquake that struck central Myanmar

Workers assist an injured man after a strong earthquake struck central Myanmar on Friday, earthquake monitoring services said

Distraught workers are seen at the site of a collapsed building in central Myanmar

Panicked residents stand outside an office building in Bangkok after the earthquake

A high-rise apartment was shaken so violently that pool water cascaded down the side

The quake was forceful enough to send water sloshing out of pools, some high above the street in high-rises, as the tremor shook.

Witnesses in Bangkok said people ran out onto the streets in panic, many of them hotel guests in bathrobes and swimming costumes as water cascaded down from an elevated pool at a luxury hotel. 

‘All of a sudden the whole building began to move, immediately there was screaming and a lot of panic,’ said Fraser Morton, a tourist from Scotland, who was in one of Bangkok’s many malls shopping for camera equipment.

‘I just started walking calmly at first but then the building started really moving, yeah, a lot of screaming, a lot of panic, people running the wrong way down the escalators, lots of banging and crashing inside the mall.’

View of a collapsed building after the strong earthquake struck central Myanmar

Like thousands of others in downtown Bangkok, Morton sought refuge in Benjasiri Park – away from the tall buildings all around.

‘I got outside and then looked up at the building and the whole building was moving, dust and debris, it was pretty intense,’ he said. ‘Lots of chaos.’

The earthquake hit Myanmar as it is in the grips of a civil war.

At a 1,000-bed general hospital in the country’s capital, rows of wounded were treated outside the emergency department, some writhing in pain, others lying still as relatives sought to comfort them.

In Mandalay, the country’s second-largest city and close to the epicenter, the earthquake damaged part of the former royal palace and buildings, according to videos and photos released on Facebook social media.

While the area is prone to earthquakes, it is generally sparsely populated, and most houses are low-rise structures.

In the Sagaing region just southwest of Mandalay, a 90-year-old bridge collapsed, and some sections of the highway connecting Mandalay and Myanmar’s largest city, Yangon, were also damaged.

In Naypyitaw, the quake damaged religious shrines, sending parts toppling to the ground, and some homes. 

People stand on a street after a strong earthquake struck central Myanmar on Friday, earthquake monitoring services said, which affected Bangkok as well with hundreds of people pouring out of buildings in the Thai capital in panic after the tremors

Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra said on Friday she had interrupted an official visit to the southern island of Phuket to hold an ‘urgent meeting’ after the quake, according to a post on X.

Tremors were also felt in China’s southwest Yunnan province, according to Beijing’s quake agency, which said the jolt measured 7.9 in magnitude.

Earthquakes are relatively common in Myanmar, where six strong quakes of 7.0 magnitude or more struck between 1930 and 1956 near the Sagaing Fault, which runs north to south through the centre of the country, according to the USGS.

A powerful 6.8-magnitude earthquake in the ancient capital Bagan in central Myanmar killed three people in 2016, also toppling spires and crumbling temple walls at the tourist destination.

The breakneck pace of development in Myanmar’s cities, combined with crumbling infrastructure and poor urban planning, has also made the country’s most populous areas vulnerable to earthquakes and other disasters, experts say.

The impoverished Southeast Asian nation has a strained medical system, especially in its rural states.