A UN report estimated direct damage from the quakes at about $6.7 billion.
The death toll from twin earthquakes that struck Venezuela on Wednesday has risen above 920, with more than 50,000 people still missing and hundreds believed trapped under rubble, Reuters reported.
The government said 920 people had been killed, 3,360 injured and 172 remained trapped after the two quakes magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 devastated parts of Caracas and surrounding areas. A weaker 4.9 tremor struck again on Friday afternoon, felt across the capital and nearby Maracay.
A UN report estimated direct damage from the quakes at about $6.7 billion. The second quake was Venezuela’s most powerful in more than a century, according to Reuters.
HUNDREDS STILL TRAPPED
In La Guaira, one of the hardest-hit areas, residents and volunteers were still pulling people from collapsed buildings with their bare hands, frustrated by a shortage of heavy equipment and limited official presence, Reuters witnesses said.
Jennifer Palacios, 25, told Reuters her six-year-old son and five other relatives remained buried inside the Hugo Chavez housing complex in La Guaira city.
“It’s the community that has managed to get people out alive,” she said. “We need them to bring cranes to move the slabs. There are still people trapped.“
Lawyer Ricardo Trias, 73, was trying to obtain a death certificate for his godson whose body had been pulled from rubble in the coastal town of Caraballeda but had not been collected by authorities.
“We want them to give us the body. We can’t take it and here it will rot,” he told Reuters. “No forensic authority has come.”
Reuters witnesses also saw looting at a damaged store in Catia la Mar, with police and national guard personnel not intervening.
Aid begins arriving
Foreign rescue teams from Mexico, El Salvador and other countries began arriving late Thursday and into Friday. A Salvadoran team of 50 used drones, heat scanners and dogs to search the ruins of three ten-storey buildings in the beachside area of Los Corales.
“People have told us they can hear people. They call them on the phone and they answer, and they can hear people screaming and calling,” Roberto Gavidia, head of the Salvadoran team, told Reuters.
Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele said on X that the team had located a 15-year-old girl trapped with her pet on the ninth floor of one building and was working to free her.
The United States said it was mobilising $150 million in aid, easing sanctions and dispatching two ships along with helicopters and aircraft to support rescue efforts. Interim President Delcy Rodriguez spoke by phone with President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Friday.
Venezuela’s oil production was not affected by the quakes, Oil Minister Paula Henao said, adding that fuel distribution would be guaranteed.
The US Geological Survey estimated more than 10,000 deaths were possible, which would make the disaster one of Latin America’s deadliest earthquakes in the last century. Nearly seven million people could be affected, the UN’s migration agency said.
