‘I thought I was going to die’ – Venezuelans describe earthquake panic
Nicole Kolster says Caracas residents evacuated to the streets, fearing further aftershocks
ByTiffanie TurnbullKelly Ng And Sales LeireBBC News World
When the ground beneath Venezuela began shaking violently on Wednesday night, Verónica feared the walls of her Caracas apartment would bury her.
“I thought I was going to die,” she told BBC Mundo.
She was at home celebrating a national holiday with her mother when tremors caused by two earthquakes struck the city, seconds apart, around 6:00 p.m. local time (22:00 GMT): the first with a magnitude of 7.2 and the second with 7.5.
So far, more than 30 people have been confirmed dead and hundreds more injured – but authorities have warned they have not even begun to assess losses in some of the hardest-hit areas.
Debris is strewn across the streets of Caracas, Venezuela’s capital, as rescuers search through the rubble of collapsed buildings for survivors. In some footage, people can be heard calling for help.
In other affected parts of Venezuela, a picture of damage continues to emerge as power and internet outages add to the chaos.
As night fell, dazed residents – many of whom were left homeless – roamed the streets, waiting for news of their homes or loved ones.
Verónica is the sister of BBC Mundo’s Valentina Oropeza – and the journalist spent hours trying to find her family after the earthquakes.
Valentina’s phone had rung with a breathless voicemail from Verónica describing the “horrible” tremors in real time, their mother’s voice distant in the background. Then radio silence.
Authorities expect death toll to rise in coming days
Panicked, Valentina began asking her network for help in contacting the two men as images of destroyed buildings on their street began to fill her phone.
When she was finally able to reach them, Verónica confirmed that she and her mother were safe, but said she had probably lost her home.
“The building is completely destroyed, the walls are cracked.”
This is not the first time that the Venezuelan capital has been hit by a major earthquake.
In 1967, a 6.6 magnitude earthquake struck Caracas and killed more than 200 people, destroying buildings in Palos Grandes and the affluent Altamira neighborhood.
Watch: Momentary earthquake hits Venezuela, leaves buildings collapsed
But Wednesday’s were worse — much longer and more intense, Valentina’s mother said.
“I never thought we would experience something like this,” she said, visibly shaken.
Coro Martinez, a resident of eastern Caracas, told the Reuters news agency the same thing.
“I’ve never experienced anything like this,” the 56-year-old said.
“There was a very loud noise. Objects fell in the house, jugs inside the refrigerator.”
BBC Mundo journalist Nicole Kolster saw the windows of her seventh-floor apartment in Palos Grandes, a privileged neighborhood in central Caracas, start to shake and had only moments to take cover.
“All I could think about was putting myself between the front door and a stone wall… to try to protect myself.”
“I thought the building was going to fall on me.”
People walk past a collapsed building after the earthquake in La Guaira
As she evacuated to the street, she said she could hear voices coming from the mountains of rubble. The survivors, so eager to escape that they had not even taken the time to put on their shoes, hugged each other and cried.
“There are people who are very sad, helpless because they can’t take their animals out,” Kolster says.
Alan Chung, a teacher in Caracas, is one of those people, anxiously waiting to see if his two cats have survived.
“Unfortunately I haven’t been able to go back to my flat to see if they are OK… fingers crossed,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
More than 700 people injured, authorities say
The flow of information from places like La Guaira – the worst-hit state, north of Caracas – has been hampered by damage to infrastructure.
But pictures and images from the area show razed buildings, large fires and people using their cars as makeshift beds.
Those who could not – or were too afraid – to return home set up tents in the streets, and the injured flooded field hospitals in the state capital.
Acting President Delcy Rodríguez said “dozens” of buildings had collapsed in the city, calling it a “disaster zone” and a “real tragedy.”
The situation is so dire that authorities are not yet able to estimate the number of people who have died.
Other hard-hit regions include Miranda, Aragua, Carabobo and Falcon states.