Juan Pablo Arraez, Regina Garcia Cano and Megan Janetsky
Updated ,first published
La Guaira: The death toll from Venezuela’s catastrophic earthquakes has risen to 235, with at least 4300 people injured, Health Minister Carlos Alvarado has told state media.
The number of dead and injured is expected to rise, with thousands reported missing after the two powerful earthquakes on Wednesday evening toppled dozens of buildings. The coastal region of La Guaira, north of the capital, Caracas, experienced some of the heaviest damage, officials said.
The search for survivors trapped below rubble is continuing following the magnitude 7.1 and 7.5 quakes, the strongest to hit Venezuela in more than a century. Many of the missing are feared dead.
“Unfortunately, we have received around 235 patients who arrived without vital signs or died when they arrived at our health facilities,” Alvarado said.
Buildings were evacuated as far away as Brazil’s Amazon, about 1700 kilometres from Caracas, where the country’s main airport was damaged and closed.
In cities across northern Venezuela, panicked residents poured into the streets, many walking among the debris to search for the missing. Television broadcasts showed rescue workers using power tools to get through piles of rubble.
In La Guaira, retired schoolteacher Juan Alberto Mendaño climbed through wreckage and past a dead body when he spotted a woman who was trapped and signalling with her hand for help.
“God, let them rescue her as quickly as possible,” said Mendaño. “When we heard the scream, there was nothing we could do.”
At another damaged apartment complex, residents shouted the names of missing people: “Mirna! Marquitos!”
Offers of help poured in from around the world, including from the United States, which seized Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, at the start of the year in a surprise military operation.
In response to the devastation, the US Treasury on Thursday moved to waive some sanctions until October 23 to allow transactions related to earthquake relief efforts that would otherwise be prohibited.
The natural disaster poses a major challenge for acting President Delcy Rodríguez, the former vice president who took office in January after Maduro’s capture. Venezuela has been facing economic disarray for more than a decade, and many people reject the legitimacy of the political movement Rodriguez represents.
The president of Venezuela’s National Assembly, Jorge Rodriguez, gave updated figures on Thursday for the numbers of dead, trapped and injured in the quakes.
Delcy Rodríguez said authorities were shifting rescue teams from other parts of the country to La Guaira, which she described as a “disaster zone”.
“Dozens of buildings have collapsed there … and we are currently carrying out intensive rescue operations to save lives,” Rodríguez said. Footage on state TV showed three children, covered in dust but alive, pulled from the rubble in La Guaira.
Rodríguez appealed to businesses to make heavy construction equipment available for rescue operations, adding that search-and-rescue teams certified by the United Nations were on their way to help.
While Venezuela sits near several fault lines, its position straddling the South American and Caribbean plates makes strong earthquakes much less common than in other parts of Latin America.
The US Geological Survey (USGS) said the first earthquake, with a magnitude of 7.2, hit west of Moron on the Caribbean coast, about 170 kilometres west of Caracas. It had a depth of 22 kilometres. Just a minute later, USGS reported a second 7.5 magnitude earthquake, with a depth of 10 kilometres and an epicentre 16 kilometres south-west of Moron.
Officials urged people to remain outside as aftershocks could cause further damage.
During the quakes, people ran from swaying buildings. Many were stunned on Thursday morning as they saw buildings reduced to skeletons, furniture hanging out of windows and helicopters circling overhead.
In La Guaira, Cristian Carreno stared at his charred apartment building tilting precariously to one side.
“I lost everything,” he said. “There are people still inside, I imagine, that couldn’t get out. It’s incredibly devastating.”
Dayana Delgado, a mother of three children, said she was desperate because her eight-year-old son was missing.
“I want to know where my child is, if he’s trapped or in a shelter,” she said.
Delgado asked where the heavy machinery was that government officials had promised, pointing out that neighbours were the ones digging through the rubble.
Authorities warned people against returning to homes with structural damage. In downtown Caracas, hundreds spent the night huddled in parks, parking lots and other open spaces.
“We were afraid the buildings would collapse on us,” said María Cristina Díaz, a 41-year-old janitor. “My mother, my daughter and I were cold. We didn’t sleep a wink.”
“It was awful. We cried, we screamed. Thankfully, we’re alive,” she added.
Parts of the capital lost power and mobile phone service, Rodríguez said. Subway services were suspended, and natural gas was shut off, she said. Classes will also be cancelled for several days, and the Education Ministry said some school buildings would be used as shelters and donation centres.
Families began posting missing person flyers with photos of loved ones, while others shared handwritten lists of names as they searched for those still unaccounted for. Venezuelans living abroad struggled to contact relatives.
The UN human rights mission in Venezuela called on the government to lift local restrictions on social media so that people could get more timely access to potentially life-saving information. In August 2024, Maduro ordered X blocked in an attempt to suppress the exchange of information among those who rejected his claim of victory in the July presidential elections.
Rodríguez declared a state of emergency in an address to the nation late on Wednesday. She said the government was creating a $US200 million ($289 million) reconstruction fund for hospitals and homes damaged by the earthquakes, and had instructed the economy and finance ministers to oversee the effort.
Countries from across the world – from Qatar to Mexico – began to send aid to Venezuela. Rodríguez expressed thanks for the messages of support and offers of help.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who had spoken to Rodríguez since the quake, said the US is “immediately deploying search and rescue teams, medical resources, and humanitarian assistance to Venezuela.”
“We will have a whole government response,” Rubio said on Thursday in Bahrain, noting they were facing logistical obstacles with Caracas’ airport collapsed. “It will be big. It will be fast. It will be effective.”
AP
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