Two major earthquakes struck the central coast of Venezuela this Wednesday, just a minute apart, causing the collapse of buildings and homes in Caracas and triggering tsunami alerts in several Caribbean countries.
According to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), the first earthquake reached a magnitude of 7.1 or 7.2 —sources differ slightly— and the second, regarded as the main aftershock, reached 7.5.
Both occurred at 6:04 PM local time, with epicenters located in the Yaracuy area and the Yumare municipality, along the Venezuelan Caribbean coast, between 168 and 280 kilometers west of the capital.
The hypocenters were shallow: 13 kilometers deep for the first and 10 kilometers for the second, which considerably amplified their destructive power on a city with aging infrastructure that had been deteriorating for years due to economic crises.
The images circulating from Caracas showed entire walls collapsed, with furniture exposed to the street and columns of dust rising over normally busy neighborhoods. Residents fled the buildings in panic and stayed on the sidewalks, many visibly shaken.
"The building was shaking. The police helped me down because I couldn't," reported to Reuters María Romero, an 80-year-old retiree who lives in the south of the capital.
The Venezuelan Minister of the Interior, Diosdado Cabello, confirmed on state television the landslides and pointed out that "there are several complicated areas" in the east of Caracas, such as Los Palos Grandes and Altamira, where he described "alarming situations" due to the collapse of buildings.
Cabello also reported that the natural gas service was cut off as a precautionary measure to prevent accidents, while the electricity supply and internet signal were interrupted in several areas of the city.
"All security and assistance agencies, civil protection, volunteers, firefighters, police—everyone is deployed," stated the official, who urged the public to stay outdoors due to the risk of new aftershocks.
At the Maiquetía International Airport, significant structural damage and scenes of panic among passengers were reported. The tremors were also felt in the states of Trujillo, Yaracuy, Carabobo, Miranda, and La Guaira, as well as in Colombian cities such as Barranquilla, Medellín, and Bogotá.
The United States Tsunami Warning System issued alerts for Venezuela, Aruba, and Bonaire, as well as precautionary notices for Puerto Rico and the British Virgin Islands. Colombia and Costa Rica later ruled out any threat to their shores.
Venezuelan authorities did not immediately provide numbers of injuries or fatalities, leaving the human toll of the disaster unspecified at the time this information was reported.
Venezuela is one of the most seismically active countries in South America due to its location at the contact zone between the South American plate and the Caribbean plate.
The most recent comparable event was the magnitude 7.3 earthquake on August 22, 2018, with its epicenter north of the Paria Peninsula, which did not result in any fatalities.
The most devastating in Venezuelan history remains that of Holy Thursday, March 26, 1812, with an estimated magnitude between 7.1 and 8.0, causing between 15,000 and 26,000 deaths.
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