A SWINDON man on holiday in central Italy has spoken of his frightening experience after he was woken by tremors from the massive earthquake yesterday that has so far left 73 people dead and hundreds more injured.

Giuseppe Bretti, son of Swindon ice cream entrepreneur Mario, is on holiday in the neighbouring town of Osimo, Ancona Province with wife Marica, 36, and two-year-old daughter Emily.

The 39-year-old, from Badbury Park said he had been woken by shakes in the night.

“We were roughly 100km from the epicentre. There were heavy tremors which caused our building to shake for eight seconds,” he said.

“Thankfully there was no damage to buildings in our town.”

His parents Mario and Vincenza, from Stratton, said they had feared for the family’s safety in the immediate aftermath.

Vincenza said: “As soon as we heard we were concerned and trying to get in touch with Giuseppe, it was a relief when we got through and spoke to him.

“He said he was woken in the night by the house shaking. They must have been really scared.”

Former Bath Road resident Ron Bateman, who now lives in Paciano, Umbria province posted on Facebook.

“All safe here. We were woken in the night by the whole house shaking. The epicentre was 84 miles away.”

The death toll was expected to rise last night as crews began to reach homes in more remote hamlets where the scenes were apocalyptic "like Dante's Inferno", according to one witness.

The area is a popular vacation spot in the summer, with populations swelling, making the number of people in the area at the time difficult to estimate.

"The town isn't here anymore," said Sergio Pirozzi, the mayor of Amatrice. "I believe the toll will rise."

The magnitude 6 quake struck at 3.36am local time and was felt across a broad swath of central Italy, including Rome, where residents woke to a long swaying followed by aftershocks. The temblor shook the Lazio region and Umbria and Le Marche on the Adriatic coast.

Italy's Prime Minister Matteo Renzi planned to head to the zone later on Wednesday and promised the area, which has suffered quakes many times before: "No family, no city, no hamlet will be left behind."

The hardest-hit towns were the tiny towns of Amatrice and Accumoli near Rieti, some 80 miles north-east of Rome, and Pescara del Tronto further east.

Italy's civil protection agency, which was coordinating the rescue, said the provisional toll was 73 dead, several hundred injured and thousands in need of temporary housing.

The centre of Amatrice was devastated, with entire blocks of buildings razed and the air thick with dust and smelling strongly of gas. Amatrice, birthplace of the famed spaghetti all'amatriciana bacon-tomato pasta sauce, is made up of 69 hamlets that rescue teams were working to reach.

Rocks and metal tumbled onto the streets of the city centre and dazed residents huddled in piazzas as more than 40 aftershocks jolted the region into the early morning hours, some as strong as 5.1.

Pope Francis skipped his traditional catechism for his Wednesday general audience and instead invited pilgrims in St Peter's Square to recite the rosary with him.