Hours after two strong earthquakes hit Venezuela, social media has been flooded with striking images and videos showing the scale of the destruction. The footage depicts shaking ground, panicked residents, collapsed buildings and rescue crews racing to find survivors in the rubble.
The quakes struck just one minute apart, with magnitudes of 7.2 and 7.5. One widely shared clip shows a local resident filming himself as he runs down the stairs of his apartment building while the structure shakes, with deep cracks opening in the walls and stairwell. Other videos from Caracas show crowds fleeing buildings and standing helplessly in the streets as the ground convulses and nearby structures begin to collapse.
Additional footage shows Venezuelan rescue teams working against the clock, forcing their way through tons of concrete and steel to reach people trapped beneath the wreckage of several apartment buildings that collapsed completely. The US Geological Survey said the scale of casualties is likely to be very high, describing the probability of significant loss of life as “extremely high.”
According to USGS data, the two main earthquakes were followed by about 20 aftershocks, occurred at two different epicenters about 45 kilometers apart and at different depths, and were strongly felt in neighboring Colombia. Venezuelan authorities have not yet released exact figures, while international aid groups are preparing emergency missions as the situation develops. US President Donald Trump called the early reports “not good,” said the quakes left a huge and shocking toll, and said the United States was ready to help and had instructed federal agencies to move quickly.
