A man takes a photo of a collapsed building after an earthquake rocked Machala, Ecuador, on Saturday.
Jhonny Crespo/AP
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Jhonny Crespo/AP
A man takes a photo of a collapsed building after an earthquake rocked Machala, Ecuador, on Saturday.
Jhonny Crespo/AP
QUITO, Ecuador — A powerful earthquake rocked southern Ecuador and northern Peru on Saturday, killing at least 14 people, trapping others under rubble and sending rescue teams out into the streets. The streets were littered with rubble and power lines were down.
The United States Geological Survey reported a magnitude 6.8 quake centered just off the Pacific coast, about 50 miles east of Guayaquil, Ecuador’s second largest city. male. One of the victims died in Peru, while 13 others died in Ecuador, where authorities also reported at least 126 people were injured.
Ecuadorian President Guillermo Lasso told reporters the quake “without a doubt… has created alarm among the population.” Lasso’s office in a statement said 11 victims died in the coastal state of El Oro and two in the highland state of Azuay.
In Peru, the earthquake was felt from the northern border with Ecuador to the central Pacific coast. Peruvian Prime Minister Alberto Otárola said a 4-year-old girl had died from a head injury in a house collapse in the Tumbes region, which borders Ecuador.
One of the victims in Azuay was a passenger in a vehicle that was crushed by rubble from a house in the Andean community of Cuenca, according to the Secretariat for Risk Management, Ecuador’s emergency response agency.
In El Oro, the agency also reported that several people were trapped under the rubble. In the community of Machala, a two-story house collapsed before people could evacuate, a jetty sank and the wall of a building cracked, trapping several people.
A police officer looks up next to a car crushed by debris after an earthquake rocked Cuenca, Ecuador, on Saturday.
Xavier Caivinagua/AP
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Xavier Caivinagua/AP
A police officer looks up next to a car crushed by debris after an earthquake rocked Cuenca, Ecuador, on Saturday.
Xavier Caivinagua/AP
The agency said firefighters worked to rescue people while the National Police assessed the damage, their job made more difficult as downed lines disrupted power service and phone.
Fabricio Cruz, a resident of Machala, said he was in his third-floor apartment when he felt a strong tremor and saw his television fall to the ground. He immediately went out.
Cruz, a 34-year-old photographer, said: “I heard my neighbors screaming and there was a lot of noise. He added that when he looked around, he noticed collapsed roofs of nearby houses.
The Ecuadorian government also reported damage to health care centers and schools. Lasso said he will travel Saturday to El Oro.
In Guayaquil, about 170 miles southwest of the capital Quito, authorities said there were cracks in buildings and homes, as well as some collapsed walls. Authorities ordered the closure of three vehicular tunnels in Guayaquil, which anchor a metro area with more than 3 million people.
Videos shared on social media showed people gathering in the streets of Guayaquil and neighboring communities. People report falling objects in their homes.
A video posted online shows the three presenters darts from their studio table like a shaker. At first, they tried to treat it as a minor earthquake but quickly ignored the camera. One host said the show would pause commercials, while another repeated, “My God, my God.”
Luis Tomalá was fishing with others when the earthquake struck. Their boat, he said, started moving “like a racehorse, we were scared and when the radio was on, we heard the news of the earthquake.” That’s when his team, Tomalá said, decided to stay at sea for fear a tsunami might develop.
A report from the Ecuadorian Adverse Events Monitoring Board ruled out a tsunami threat.
Peruvian authorities say the old walls of a military barracks have collapsed in Tumbes.
Ecuador is special prone to earthquakes. In 2016, one earthquake centered further north on the Pacific Coast in a more sparsely populated part of the country killed more than 600 people.
Katherine Cruz, a student at Machala, said her house shook so violently that she couldn’t even get up to leave her room and run into the street.
“It’s horrible. I’ve never felt anything like this in my life,” she said.
