Rescue teams on Thursday raced to the areas hardest hit by a pair of powerful earthquakes that rocked Venezuela, killing at least 164 people, injuring nearly 1,000 and trapping probably thousands others beneath collapsed buildings.
Wednesday evening’s 7.2 and 7.5-magnitude earthquakes were among the strongest to strike Venezuela in more than a century and could be felt throughout the region. The country’s main airport was damaged and closed, while buildings were evacuated in places as far away as Brazil’s Amazon, about 1,700 km from Venezuela’s capital Caracas.
Television broadcasts showed rescue workers using power tools to work their way into piles of rubble where buildings once stood. Panicked residents were sent pouring into the streets, and after the quakes many people walked among the debris searching for the missing among collapsed buildings and toppled electric poles.
Acting President Delcy Rodriguez said the authorities were shifting rescue teams from other parts of the country to La Guaira, which sits north of Caracas on the coast. Officials were trying to make the most of the daylight hours to speed up efforts to rescue people believed to remain trapped under the rubble, she said.
Footage on state TV showed three children, covered in dust but alive, pulled from the rubble in La Guaira state, which Rodriguez described as a “disaster zone” and one of the areas hardest hit by the quakes because of the large number of collapsed buildings.
Video shared online appeared to show dozens of people, some lying on the ground and others on hospital beds, being treated outside a hospital in La Guaira.
While Venezuela sits near multiple fault lines, its position straddling the South American and Caribbean plates makes strong earthquakes much less common than in other parts of Latin America.
During the quakes, people ran from swaying buildings in Caracas, many visibly shocked when they turned back to see destroyed walls that left furniture visible from the street. “It started off gently and then gradually grew, and in the end, we all had to leave our houses, go outside and gather together,” Caracas resident Hector Ricci said.
The US Geological Survey said the first earthquake, with a magnitude of 7.2, hit west of Moron on the Caribbean coast, about 170 km west of Caracas. It had a depth of 22 km. Just a minute later, the USGS reported a second 7.5-magnitude earthquake, with a depth of 10 km and an epicentre 16 km southwest of Moron.
