The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) manages figures indicating that the number of missing persons due to the earthquakes that shook northern Venezuela on Wednesday could reach as many as 50,000 people.
Sources from that office clarified to the EFE agency that these are unconfirmed data not directly attributable to the UN as an official figure, and that they are being handled parallel to the verified tally of 920 dead and 3,360 injured reported by Venezuelan authorities.
The figure is even more alarming in light of the data collected by Newsweek: as of Friday, 57,287 people were reported missing, of which 49,519 had no contact with their family or loved ones.
The double earthquake of magnitudes 7.2 and 7.5 that struck the region on Wednesday, June 24, with only 39 seconds between the two events, is the strongest recorded in Venezuela since 1900, according to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), which issued a Red Alert due to the estimated impact.
The magnitude of the catastrophe is also reflected in estimates by the International Organization for Migration (IOM): up to 6.76 million people may have been affected by the earthquakes, including two million in the capital, Caracas.
The most severe damage is concentrated in the state of La Guaira, declared a "disaster zone," where more than 100 buildings have collapsed.
In Caracas, at least two structures collapsed in the Chacao municipality and more than 90 were damaged, according to reports about the collapsed buildings in the capital.
The international response has been massive: 30 urban search and rescue teams from at least 16 countries —including Switzerland, the United States, France, Spain, Germany, Chile, Colombia, and Mexico— already number 1,600 personnel and 100 tracking dogs deployed on the ground or en route.
The United States announced a allocation of 150 million dollars in humanitarian aid: 100 million allocated to OCHA and 50 million for local organizations.
OCHA itself released 15 million dollars from its Central Emergency Response Fund, and the International Red Cross issued an emergency appeal for 50 million Swiss francs.
The regime of Nicolás Maduro, which remained silent for at least an hour and a half after the earthquakes before issuing an official report, ordered the militarization of La Guaira with 11,500 personnel from the Bolivarian National Guard, the Armed Forces, the Bolivarian National Police, and the National Militia. This response combines rescue efforts with maintaining order in the face of the risk of looting in a completely devastated area.
The pre-existing humanitarian crisis in Venezuela—marked by the collapse of infrastructure after decades of mismanagement by the regime, massive cuts in electricity and telecommunications, and institutional weakness—critically worsens the state's capacity to respond and complicates the accurate recording of victims in the most affected areas, which partly explains the enormous gap between the confirmed death toll and the number of disappearances reported by the UN.
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