The death toll from twin earthquakes in Venezuela has soared to 589, with thousands more unaccounted for as international rescue teams and sniffer dogs arrive to help find survivors. Rescuers are using heavy machinery and their bare hands to claw out people trapped under rubble in the worst-hit earthquake zone, north of the capital Caracas. At one of the flattened buildings, workers were seen using sledgehammers to break debris and calling for "absolute silence" to detect cries from survivors.
Desperate Search for Survivors
Oil-rich Venezuela is grappling with its worst natural disaster in over a century, exacerbated by more than a decade of economic collapse that has hollowed out hospitals and public services. The country is still in a fragile transition six months after the United States ousted leader Nicolas Maduro. Rescue efforts have been slow, with desperate calls for more heavy machinery as families stand by helpless to pull out loved ones they could hear alive in the rubble.
"It is a lot of rock, and with bare hands it is impossible," said Amparo del Giudice, scrabbling through rubble in search of her son. Two earthquakes, measured at magnitudes 7.2 and 7.5, hit northern Venezuela within less than a minute of each other on Wednesday night, causing hundreds of buildings to collapse.
International Aid Mobilizes
Pro-US interim president Delcy Rodriguez confirmed the death toll at 589, with almost 3,000 injured. Social media was flooded with requests for information on the missing, with an online portal listing almost 50,000 people that loved ones were trying to locate. National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez said Thursday that more than 200 people were confirmed trapped live.
Help has begun to arrive, with Spanish, Salvadoran, Swiss, Colombian, and Mexican rescue teams already on the ground. A senior US military official also landed in Caracas to oversee Washington's relief efforts. Nations around the world have pledged to send rescuers, money, and aid, with the United States saying it was deploying two warships, transport planes, and helicopters and mobilizing $150 million in aid. Washington has also suspended economic sanctions on Venezuela that could have hindered rescue operations for four months.
Humanitarian Crisis Deepens
The UN humanitarian agency OCHA said search and rescue teams from at least 17 countries were being mobilized to help find survivors. "Even before the earthquakes, millions of people across Venezuela were facing food insecurity, collapsing health services, protection risks, and limited access to basic services," the UN and other aid agencies said in a statement Friday. "The international community must not allow this emergency to deepen into a larger human tragedy".
Earthquakes of similar magnitude claimed more than 200,000 lives in Haiti in January 2010 and 73,000 lives in Kashmir in October 2005. The dead included nine Portuguese nationals, four Spaniards, two Brazilians, two Chinese nationals, and one Italian-Venezuelan. Fifty-six Portuguese citizens and 120 Spaniards were missing or otherwise unaccounted for, according to their respective governments.
