The death toll from Wednesday’s double earthquake in Venezuela has risen to at least 235, with hundreds still trapped under collapsed buildings and more than 46,000 people unaccounted for, as rescue teams worked through Thursday to reach survivors across the devastated areas around Caracas.
Health Minister Carlos Alvarado said on Thursday that around 235 people had been received dead at medical centres, a sharp rise from the 32 confirmed on Wednesday night. Jorge Rodriguez, head of Venezuela’s national assembly, said 200 people remained trapped, with 250 buildings damaged or destroyed. Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello said some 70,000 families in La Guaira state had been affected.
La Guaira, the coastal state adjoining Caracas and home to the capital’s main airport, remained the hardest-hit area. The airport was closed after sustaining damage. Electricity was scarce across parts of the state, and aftershocks continued to rattle Caracas and surrounding coastal communities. At least eight hospitals, the headquarters of the Venezuelan Red Cross and the French embassy were among buildings reported badly damaged.
Acting President Delcy Rodriguez said the government was working with private companies to bring in heavy equipment to speed up rescues. “It has become a disaster zone,” she said.
Emergency workers and volunteers searched through collapsed buildings through the night and into Thursday. In some areas, residents said official help had been slow to arrive. In La Guaira city, volunteers dug through wreckage with their bare hands as families waited for news of missing relatives.
Yamileth Jimenez, a resident of La Guaira city, said her 19-year-old son remained trapped in the debris of their seven-storey apartment building. “He’s under the slabs and there’s no machinery to get him out,” she said.
A website created to track missing people and shared by opposition leaders listed more than 46,000 people as unaccounted for on Thursday evening, up from 6,600 the previous night. Reuters said it could not independently verify the figures.
The international response expanded significantly on Thursday. Washington moved to ease sanctions, authorising transactions related to earthquake aid that would otherwise be prohibited. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington would send rescue teams while the Pentagon would help with logistics and support Caracas’ damaged airport. UN aid chief Tom Fletcher said the organisation was coordinating international rescue teams and that a massive collective effort would be needed in a country where eight million people had required humanitarian assistance before the earthquake. SpaceX said it would provide free Starlink service through July 25 for customers in affected areas and was working to deploy terminals to the hardest-hit zones.
Oil infrastructure appeared to have been largely spared, with foreign energy companies saying their operations had not suffered major disruption.
