7.1 Quake Hits Near Mexico City
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Deadly 7.1 magnitude earthquake kills 149 in central Mexico
Mark Stevenson, Christopher Sherman And Peter Orsi, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First posted: Tuesday, September 19, 2017 03:30 PM EDT | Updated: Tuesday, September 19, 2017 10:51 PM EDT
MEXICO CITY — A powerful earthquake shook central Mexico on Tuesday, collapsing buildings in plumes of dust and killing at least 139 people. Thousands fled into the streets in panic, and many stayed to help rescue those trapped.
Dozens of buildings tumbled into mounds of rubble or were severely damaged in densely populated parts of Mexico City and nearby states. Mayor Miguel Angel Mancera said buildings fell at 44 places in the capital alone as high-rises across the city swayed sickeningly.
Hours after the magnitude 7.1 quake, rescue workers were still clawing through the wreckage of a primary school that partly collapsed in the city’s south looking for any children who might be trapped. Some relatives said they had received Whatsapp message from two girls inside.
The quake is the deadliest in Mexico since a 1985 quake on the same date killed thousands. It came less than two weeks after another powerful quake caused 90 deaths in the country’s south.
Luis Felipe Puente, head of the national Civil Defence agency, reported Tuesday night that the confirmed death toll had been raised to 149.
His tweet said 55 people died in Morelos state, just south of Mexico City, while 49 died in the capital and 32 were killed in nearby Puebla state, where the quake was centred. Ten people died in the State of Mexico, which surrounds Mexico City on three sides, and three were killed in Guerrero state, he said.
The count did not include one death that officials in the southern state of Oaxaca reported earlier as quake-related.
The federal government declared a state of disaster in Mexico City, freeing up emergency funds. President Enrique Pena Nieto said he had ordered all hospitals to open their doors to the injured.
Mancera, the Mexico City mayor, said 50 to 60 people were rescued alive by citizens and emergency workers in the capital. Authorities said at least 70 people in the capital had been hospitalized for injuries.
The federal interior minister, Miguel Angel Osorio Chong, said authorities had reports of people possibly still being trapped in collapsed buildings. He said search efforts were slow because of the fragility of rubble.
“It has to be done very carefully,” he said. And “time is against us.”
At one site, reporters saw onlookers cheer as a woman was pulled from the rubble. Rescuers immediately called for silence so they could listen for others who might be trapped.
Mariana Morales, a 26-year-old nutritionist, was one of many who spontaneously participated in rescue efforts.
She wore a paper face mask and her hands were still dusty from having joined a rescue brigade to clear rubble from a building that fell in a cloud of dust before her eyes, about 15 minutes after the quake.
Morales said she was in a taxi when the quake struck, and she got out and sat on a sidewalk to try to recover from the scare. Then, just a few yards away, the three-story building fell.
A dust-covered Carlos Mendoza, 30, said that he and other volunteers had been able to pull two people alive from the ruins of a collapsed apartment building after three hours of effort.
“We saw this and came to help,” he said. “It’s ugly, very ugly.”
Alma Gonzalez was in her fourth floor apartment in the Roma neighbourhood when the quake pancaked the ground floor of her building, leaving her no way out — until neighbours set up a ladder on their roof and helped her slide out a side window.
Gala Dluzhynska was taking a class with 11 other women on the second floor of a building on trendy Alvaro Obregon street when the quake struck and window and ceiling panels fell as the building began to tear apart.
She said she fell in the stairs and people began to walk over her, before someone finally pulled her up.
“There were no stairs anymore. There were rocks,” she said.
They reached the bottom only to find it barred. A security guard finally came and unlocked it.
The quake sent people throughout the city fleeing from homes and offices, and many people remained in the streets for hours, fearful of returning to the structures.
Alarms blared and traffic stopped around the Angel of Independence monument on the iconic Reforma Avenue.
Electricity and cellphone service was interrupted in many areas and traffic was snarled as signal lights went dark.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the magnitude 7.1 quake hit at 1:14 p.m. (2:15 p.m. EDT) and was centred near the Puebla state town of Raboso, about 76 miles (123 kilometres) southeast of Mexico City.
Puebla Gov. Tony Gali tweeted there were damaged buildings in the city of Cholula, including collapsed church steeples.
In Jojutla, a town in neighbouring Morelos state, the town hall, a church and other buildings tumbled down, and 12 people were reported killed.
The Instituto Morelos secondary school partly collapsed in Jojutla, but school director Adelina Anzures said the earthquake drill that the school held in the morning was a boon when the real thing hit just two hours later.
“I told them that it was not a game, that we should be prepared,” Anzures said of the drill. When the shaking began, children and teachers filed out rapidly and no one was hurt, she said. “It fell and everything inside was damaged.”
Earlier in the day, workplaces across Mexico City held earthquake readiness drills on the anniversary of the 1985 quake, a magnitude 8.0 shake that killed thousands of people and devastated large parts of the capital.
In that tragedy, too, ordinary citizens played a crucial role in rescue efforts that overwhelmed officials.
Market stall vendor Edith Lopez, 25, said she was in a taxi a few blocks away when the quake struck Tuesday. She said she saw glass bursting out of the windows of some buildings. She was anxiously trying to locate her children, whom she had left in the care of her disabled mother.
Local media broadcast video of whitecap waves churning the city’s normally placid canals of Xochimilco as boats bobbed up and down.
Mexico City’s international airport suspended operations and was checking facilities for damage.
Much of Mexico City is built on former lakebed, and the soil can amplify the effects of earthquakes centred hundreds of miles away.
The new quake appeared to be unrelated to the magnitude 8.1 temblor that hit Sept. 7 off Mexico’s southern coast and also was felt strongly in the capital.
U.S. Geological Survey seismologist Paul Earle noted the epicenters of the two quakes were 400 miles (650 kilometres) apart and said most aftershocks are within (60 miles) 100 kilometres.
There have been 19 earthquakes of magnitude 6.5 or larger within 150 miles (250 kilometres) of Tuesday’s quake over the past century, Earle said.
Earth usually has about 15 to 20 earthquakes this size or larger each year, Earle said.
Initial calculations showed that more than 30 million people would have felt moderate shaking from Tuesday’s quake.
Deadly 7.1 magnitude earthquake kills 149 in central Mexico | World | News | Tor
trumpty dumpty's wrath.
Mark Stevenson, Christopher Sherman And Peter Orsi, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First posted: Tuesday, September 19, 2017 03:30 PM EDT | Updated: Tuesday, September 19, 2017 10:51 PM EDT
MEXICO CITY — A powerful earthquake shook central Mexico on Tuesday, collapsing buildings in plumes of dust and killing at least 139 people. Thousands fled into the streets in panic, and many stayed to help rescue those trapped.
Dozens of buildings tumbled into mounds of rubble or were severely damaged in densely populated parts of Mexico City and nearby states. Mayor Miguel Angel Mancera said buildings fell at 44 places in the capital alone as high-rises across the city swayed sickeningly.
Hours after the magnitude 7.1 quake, rescue workers were still clawing through the wreckage of a primary school that partly collapsed in the city’s south looking for any children who might be trapped. Some relatives said they had received Whatsapp message from two girls inside.
The quake is the deadliest in Mexico since a 1985 quake on the same date killed thousands. It came less than two weeks after another powerful quake caused 90 deaths in the country’s south.
Luis Felipe Puente, head of the national Civil Defence agency, reported Tuesday night that the confirmed death toll had been raised to 149.
His tweet said 55 people died in Morelos state, just south of Mexico City, while 49 died in the capital and 32 were killed in nearby Puebla state, where the quake was centred. Ten people died in the State of Mexico, which surrounds Mexico City on three sides, and three were killed in Guerrero state, he said.
The count did not include one death that officials in the southern state of Oaxaca reported earlier as quake-related.
The federal government declared a state of disaster in Mexico City, freeing up emergency funds. President Enrique Pena Nieto said he had ordered all hospitals to open their doors to the injured.
Mancera, the Mexico City mayor, said 50 to 60 people were rescued alive by citizens and emergency workers in the capital. Authorities said at least 70 people in the capital had been hospitalized for injuries.
The federal interior minister, Miguel Angel Osorio Chong, said authorities had reports of people possibly still being trapped in collapsed buildings. He said search efforts were slow because of the fragility of rubble.
“It has to be done very carefully,” he said. And “time is against us.”
At one site, reporters saw onlookers cheer as a woman was pulled from the rubble. Rescuers immediately called for silence so they could listen for others who might be trapped.
Mariana Morales, a 26-year-old nutritionist, was one of many who spontaneously participated in rescue efforts.
She wore a paper face mask and her hands were still dusty from having joined a rescue brigade to clear rubble from a building that fell in a cloud of dust before her eyes, about 15 minutes after the quake.
Morales said she was in a taxi when the quake struck, and she got out and sat on a sidewalk to try to recover from the scare. Then, just a few yards away, the three-story building fell.
A dust-covered Carlos Mendoza, 30, said that he and other volunteers had been able to pull two people alive from the ruins of a collapsed apartment building after three hours of effort.
“We saw this and came to help,” he said. “It’s ugly, very ugly.”
Alma Gonzalez was in her fourth floor apartment in the Roma neighbourhood when the quake pancaked the ground floor of her building, leaving her no way out — until neighbours set up a ladder on their roof and helped her slide out a side window.
Gala Dluzhynska was taking a class with 11 other women on the second floor of a building on trendy Alvaro Obregon street when the quake struck and window and ceiling panels fell as the building began to tear apart.
She said she fell in the stairs and people began to walk over her, before someone finally pulled her up.
“There were no stairs anymore. There were rocks,” she said.
They reached the bottom only to find it barred. A security guard finally came and unlocked it.
The quake sent people throughout the city fleeing from homes and offices, and many people remained in the streets for hours, fearful of returning to the structures.
Alarms blared and traffic stopped around the Angel of Independence monument on the iconic Reforma Avenue.
Electricity and cellphone service was interrupted in many areas and traffic was snarled as signal lights went dark.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the magnitude 7.1 quake hit at 1:14 p.m. (2:15 p.m. EDT) and was centred near the Puebla state town of Raboso, about 76 miles (123 kilometres) southeast of Mexico City.
Puebla Gov. Tony Gali tweeted there were damaged buildings in the city of Cholula, including collapsed church steeples.
In Jojutla, a town in neighbouring Morelos state, the town hall, a church and other buildings tumbled down, and 12 people were reported killed.
The Instituto Morelos secondary school partly collapsed in Jojutla, but school director Adelina Anzures said the earthquake drill that the school held in the morning was a boon when the real thing hit just two hours later.
“I told them that it was not a game, that we should be prepared,” Anzures said of the drill. When the shaking began, children and teachers filed out rapidly and no one was hurt, she said. “It fell and everything inside was damaged.”
Earlier in the day, workplaces across Mexico City held earthquake readiness drills on the anniversary of the 1985 quake, a magnitude 8.0 shake that killed thousands of people and devastated large parts of the capital.
In that tragedy, too, ordinary citizens played a crucial role in rescue efforts that overwhelmed officials.
Market stall vendor Edith Lopez, 25, said she was in a taxi a few blocks away when the quake struck Tuesday. She said she saw glass bursting out of the windows of some buildings. She was anxiously trying to locate her children, whom she had left in the care of her disabled mother.
Local media broadcast video of whitecap waves churning the city’s normally placid canals of Xochimilco as boats bobbed up and down.
Mexico City’s international airport suspended operations and was checking facilities for damage.
Much of Mexico City is built on former lakebed, and the soil can amplify the effects of earthquakes centred hundreds of miles away.
The new quake appeared to be unrelated to the magnitude 8.1 temblor that hit Sept. 7 off Mexico’s southern coast and also was felt strongly in the capital.
U.S. Geological Survey seismologist Paul Earle noted the epicenters of the two quakes were 400 miles (650 kilometres) apart and said most aftershocks are within (60 miles) 100 kilometres.
There have been 19 earthquakes of magnitude 6.5 or larger within 150 miles (250 kilometres) of Tuesday’s quake over the past century, Earle said.
Earth usually has about 15 to 20 earthquakes this size or larger each year, Earle said.
Initial calculations showed that more than 30 million people would have felt moderate shaking from Tuesday’s quake.
Deadly 7.1 magnitude earthquake kills 149 in central Mexico | World | News | Tor
trumpty dumpty's wrath.
Barack Obama sends a 'big hug for everyone' in Mexico City after devastating quake
...and Trump?? Nothing
Obama is no longer President, and still is a better President than Trumptard.
...and Trump?? Nothing
Obama is no longer President, and still is a better President than Trumptard.
You mean the guy who used to do this to weddings, hospitals, and schools in other countries the US is not at war with with drones?
Ah...yeah....that was ....better?
Obama claims US drones strikes have killed up to 116 civilians
Long-awaited assessment of death toll under Obama, criticized as an undercount, acknowledges government does not always know how many civilians it kills
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jul/01/obama-drones-strikes-civilian-deaths
Ah...yeah....that was ....better?
Obama claims US drones strikes have killed up to 116 civilians
Long-awaited assessment of death toll under Obama, criticized as an undercount, acknowledges government does not always know how many civilians it kills
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jul/01/obama-drones-strikes-civilian-deaths
Shawn Mendes says Mexico City earthquake was 'pretty scary,' donates $100K
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First posted: Friday, September 22, 2017 01:33 PM EDT | Updated: Friday, September 22, 2017 01:44 PM EDT
Shawn Mendes has launched an online fundraiser to help those affected by the Mexican earthquake just days after he escaped safely from the quake ahead of a planned show in Mexico City, an incident he called “pretty scary.”
The Canadian singer-songwriter and his manager, Andrew Gertler, have gotten things started with a $100,000 donation to the fundraiser on GoFundMe’s Crowdrise platform. The money will go to “directly to disaster relief in Mexico” via American Red Cross.
In an email to The Associated Press, Mendes said he was in his hotel getting ready for his show the next day when the quake hit.
“The whole building was shaking pretty severely, but we were fortunate to be somewhere that was structurally sound enough to withstand it,” he wrote. “At first I didn’t know what was happening, and then pretty quickly, after about 30 seconds, I clued in that it was an earthquake. Shortly after that we heard sirens and the emergency evacuation announcements from the hotel, and were able to make it down to the street safely.”
“There were just so many people out on the streets trying to stay safe and that had been evacuated from buildings, and as we were walking saw quite a few buildings that had collapsed facades, windows shattering on the streets,” he wrote.
The quake has reduced buildings to rubble in Mexico and left hundreds dead. Mendes said he sends his prayers to everyone effected and would love to return when he can.
“I want to come back as soon as possible. It is an incredible city and the people there are so strong and resilient,” he said.
[youtube]yOVolC7oKkQ[/youtube]
http://crowdrise.com/o/en/team/shawnmendes
Shawn Mendes says Mexico City earthquake was 'pretty scary,' donates $100K | Cel
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First posted: Friday, September 22, 2017 01:33 PM EDT | Updated: Friday, September 22, 2017 01:44 PM EDT
Shawn Mendes has launched an online fundraiser to help those affected by the Mexican earthquake just days after he escaped safely from the quake ahead of a planned show in Mexico City, an incident he called “pretty scary.”
The Canadian singer-songwriter and his manager, Andrew Gertler, have gotten things started with a $100,000 donation to the fundraiser on GoFundMe’s Crowdrise platform. The money will go to “directly to disaster relief in Mexico” via American Red Cross.
In an email to The Associated Press, Mendes said he was in his hotel getting ready for his show the next day when the quake hit.
“The whole building was shaking pretty severely, but we were fortunate to be somewhere that was structurally sound enough to withstand it,” he wrote. “At first I didn’t know what was happening, and then pretty quickly, after about 30 seconds, I clued in that it was an earthquake. Shortly after that we heard sirens and the emergency evacuation announcements from the hotel, and were able to make it down to the street safely.”
“There were just so many people out on the streets trying to stay safe and that had been evacuated from buildings, and as we were walking saw quite a few buildings that had collapsed facades, windows shattering on the streets,” he wrote.
The quake has reduced buildings to rubble in Mexico and left hundreds dead. Mendes said he sends his prayers to everyone effected and would love to return when he can.
“I want to come back as soon as possible. It is an incredible city and the people there are so strong and resilient,” he said.
[youtube]yOVolC7oKkQ[/youtube]
http://crowdrise.com/o/en/team/shawnmendes
Shawn Mendes says Mexico City earthquake was 'pretty scary,' donates $100K | Cel
New earthquake, magnitude 6.1, shakes jittery Mexico
Peter Orsi, Maria Verza And Gisela Salomon, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First posted: Saturday, September 23, 2017 11:37 AM EDT | Updated: Saturday, September 23, 2017 08:22 PM EDT
MEXICO CITY — A strong new earthquake shook Mexico on Saturday, killing at least one person, toppling already damaged homes and a highway bridge, and causing new alarm in a country reeling from two even more powerful quakes that together have killed more than 400 people.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the new, magnitude 6.1 temblor was centred about 11 miles (18 kilometres) south-southeast of Matias Romero in the state of Oaxaca, which was the region most battered by a magnitude 8.1 quake on Sept. 7.
It was among thousands of aftershocks recorded in the wake of that earlier quake, which was the most powerful to hit Mexico in 32 years and killed at least 96 people.
The government of Oaxaca state reported that some homes collapsed and one woman died when a wall of her home fell on her in the town of Asuncion Ixtaltepec.
Four people were injured in Juchitan and three in Tlacotepec, but none of their lives were in danger. Another person suffered a broken clavicle in the town of Xadani. Three hotels and two churches were damaged and a highway bridge collapsed. The Federal Police agency said the bridge already been closed due to damage after the Sept. 7 quake.
Bettina Cruz, a resident of Juchitan, Oaxaca, said by phone with her voice still shaking that the new quake felt “horrible.”
“Homes that were still standing just fell down,” Cruz said. “It’s hard. We are all in the streets.”
Cruz belongs to a social collective and said that when the shaking began, she was riding in a truck carrying supplies to victims of the earlier quake.
Nataniel Hernandez said by phone from Tonala, in the southern state of Chiapas, which was also hit hard by the earlier quake, that it was one of the strongest aftershocks he has felt.
“Since Sept. 7 it has not stopped shaking,” Hernandez.
U.S. Geological Survey geophysicist Paul Caruso said the new temblor was an aftershock of the 8.1 quake, and after a jolt of that size even buildings left standing can be more vulnerable.
“So a smaller earthquake can cause the damaged buildings to fail,” Caruso said.
“At the moment the greatest damage has been to the Ixtaltepec bridge, which should be rebuilt, and structures with previous damage that collapsed,” President Enrique Pena Nieto tweeted. He said government workers were fanning out in Juchitan to provide help to anyone who needs it.
Jaime Hernandez, director of the Federal Electrical Commission, said the quake knocked out power to 327,000 homes and businesses in Oaxaca but service had been restored to 72 per cent of customers within a few hours.
Buildings swayed in Mexico City, where nerves are still raw from Tuesday’s magnitude 7.1 temblor that has killed at least 305 across the region. Many residents and visitors fled homes, hotels and businesses, some in tears.
At the Xoco General Hospital, which is treating the largest number of quake victims, workers ordered visitors to evacuate when seismic alarms began to blare.
That included Syntia Pereda, 43, who was reluctant to leave the bedside of her sleeping boyfriend. Jesus Gonzalez, 49, fell from a third-story balcony of a building where he was working during Tuesday’s quake and was awaiting surgery.
But she controlled her emotions, went outside and came back when the trembling was over.
“We are getting used to this,” Pereda said. “Every so often we hear the alarm ... you say, well, it is God’s will.”
Alejandra Castellanos was on the second floor of a hotel in a central neighbourhood of Mexico City and ran down the stairs and outside with her husband.
“I was frightened because I thought, not again!” Castellanos said.
Mayor Miguel Angel Mancera said there were no reports of significant new damage in the capital, and rescue efforts related to Tuesday’s quake were continuing. He reported that two people died of apparent heart attacks during the new temblor.
At the site of an office building that collapsed Tuesday and where an around-the-clock search for survivors was still ongoing, rescuers briefly evacuated from atop the pile of rubble after the morning quake before returning to work removing cement, tiles and other debris.
As rescue operations stretched into Day 5, residents throughout the capital have held out hope that dozens still missing might be found alive. More than half the dead — 167 — perished in the capital, while another 73 died in the state of Morelos, 45 in Puebla, 13 in Mexico State, six in Guerrero and one in Oaxaca.
Along a 60-foot stretch of a bike lane in Mexico City, families huddled under tarps and donated blankets, awaiting word of loved ones trapped in the four-story-high pile of rubble behind them.
Lidia Albarran, whose niece was buried in the collapse of an office building a block away, heard the alarm and worried that the latest quake could endanger those under the pile of rubble.
“You feel fear. Before, earthquakes did not make me afraid, but now ... thinking about all that could have happened in the building,” Albarran said.
In a city still on edge, many residents have spoken of lingering anxiety: imagining the ground is moving when it isn’t, hearing a police siren wail and thinking it’s a quake alarm, breaking into sobs at unexpected moments.
“There is collective panic. I feel afraid even when a car passes by,” said Dulce Bueno, who came Saturday morning with her husband and daughter to the hard-hit Condesa neighbourhood. They brought suitcases to collect the belongings of their daughter, who lived in a damaged building beside one that collapsed and who is now moving in with them.
“They have told us it is well constructed, that it’s a bunker,” Bueno said of her own home. “But if the tremors continue, will it hold up?”
Vicente Aparicio, 76, gazed at the building where he lived in southern Mexico City as his wife listened to an engineer explaining the damage it had suffered. He vowed never to return; his family is fortunate enough to have another apartment to go to and the means to go on with their lives.
“But what about those who do not?” Aparicio wondered.
He added: “How does a city recover from a shock like this?”
Associated Press writer Christine Armario contributed to this report.
New earthquake, magnitude 6.1, shakes jittery Mexico | World | News | Toronto Su
Peter Orsi, Maria Verza And Gisela Salomon, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First posted: Saturday, September 23, 2017 11:37 AM EDT | Updated: Saturday, September 23, 2017 08:22 PM EDT
MEXICO CITY — A strong new earthquake shook Mexico on Saturday, killing at least one person, toppling already damaged homes and a highway bridge, and causing new alarm in a country reeling from two even more powerful quakes that together have killed more than 400 people.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the new, magnitude 6.1 temblor was centred about 11 miles (18 kilometres) south-southeast of Matias Romero in the state of Oaxaca, which was the region most battered by a magnitude 8.1 quake on Sept. 7.
It was among thousands of aftershocks recorded in the wake of that earlier quake, which was the most powerful to hit Mexico in 32 years and killed at least 96 people.
The government of Oaxaca state reported that some homes collapsed and one woman died when a wall of her home fell on her in the town of Asuncion Ixtaltepec.
Four people were injured in Juchitan and three in Tlacotepec, but none of their lives were in danger. Another person suffered a broken clavicle in the town of Xadani. Three hotels and two churches were damaged and a highway bridge collapsed. The Federal Police agency said the bridge already been closed due to damage after the Sept. 7 quake.
Bettina Cruz, a resident of Juchitan, Oaxaca, said by phone with her voice still shaking that the new quake felt “horrible.”
“Homes that were still standing just fell down,” Cruz said. “It’s hard. We are all in the streets.”
Cruz belongs to a social collective and said that when the shaking began, she was riding in a truck carrying supplies to victims of the earlier quake.
Nataniel Hernandez said by phone from Tonala, in the southern state of Chiapas, which was also hit hard by the earlier quake, that it was one of the strongest aftershocks he has felt.
“Since Sept. 7 it has not stopped shaking,” Hernandez.
U.S. Geological Survey geophysicist Paul Caruso said the new temblor was an aftershock of the 8.1 quake, and after a jolt of that size even buildings left standing can be more vulnerable.
“So a smaller earthquake can cause the damaged buildings to fail,” Caruso said.
“At the moment the greatest damage has been to the Ixtaltepec bridge, which should be rebuilt, and structures with previous damage that collapsed,” President Enrique Pena Nieto tweeted. He said government workers were fanning out in Juchitan to provide help to anyone who needs it.
Jaime Hernandez, director of the Federal Electrical Commission, said the quake knocked out power to 327,000 homes and businesses in Oaxaca but service had been restored to 72 per cent of customers within a few hours.
Buildings swayed in Mexico City, where nerves are still raw from Tuesday’s magnitude 7.1 temblor that has killed at least 305 across the region. Many residents and visitors fled homes, hotels and businesses, some in tears.
At the Xoco General Hospital, which is treating the largest number of quake victims, workers ordered visitors to evacuate when seismic alarms began to blare.
That included Syntia Pereda, 43, who was reluctant to leave the bedside of her sleeping boyfriend. Jesus Gonzalez, 49, fell from a third-story balcony of a building where he was working during Tuesday’s quake and was awaiting surgery.
But she controlled her emotions, went outside and came back when the trembling was over.
“We are getting used to this,” Pereda said. “Every so often we hear the alarm ... you say, well, it is God’s will.”
Alejandra Castellanos was on the second floor of a hotel in a central neighbourhood of Mexico City and ran down the stairs and outside with her husband.
“I was frightened because I thought, not again!” Castellanos said.
Mayor Miguel Angel Mancera said there were no reports of significant new damage in the capital, and rescue efforts related to Tuesday’s quake were continuing. He reported that two people died of apparent heart attacks during the new temblor.
At the site of an office building that collapsed Tuesday and where an around-the-clock search for survivors was still ongoing, rescuers briefly evacuated from atop the pile of rubble after the morning quake before returning to work removing cement, tiles and other debris.
As rescue operations stretched into Day 5, residents throughout the capital have held out hope that dozens still missing might be found alive. More than half the dead — 167 — perished in the capital, while another 73 died in the state of Morelos, 45 in Puebla, 13 in Mexico State, six in Guerrero and one in Oaxaca.
Along a 60-foot stretch of a bike lane in Mexico City, families huddled under tarps and donated blankets, awaiting word of loved ones trapped in the four-story-high pile of rubble behind them.
Lidia Albarran, whose niece was buried in the collapse of an office building a block away, heard the alarm and worried that the latest quake could endanger those under the pile of rubble.
“You feel fear. Before, earthquakes did not make me afraid, but now ... thinking about all that could have happened in the building,” Albarran said.
In a city still on edge, many residents have spoken of lingering anxiety: imagining the ground is moving when it isn’t, hearing a police siren wail and thinking it’s a quake alarm, breaking into sobs at unexpected moments.
“There is collective panic. I feel afraid even when a car passes by,” said Dulce Bueno, who came Saturday morning with her husband and daughter to the hard-hit Condesa neighbourhood. They brought suitcases to collect the belongings of their daughter, who lived in a damaged building beside one that collapsed and who is now moving in with them.
“They have told us it is well constructed, that it’s a bunker,” Bueno said of her own home. “But if the tremors continue, will it hold up?”
Vicente Aparicio, 76, gazed at the building where he lived in southern Mexico City as his wife listened to an engineer explaining the damage it had suffered. He vowed never to return; his family is fortunate enough to have another apartment to go to and the means to go on with their lives.
“But what about those who do not?” Aparicio wondered.
He added: “How does a city recover from a shock like this?”
Associated Press writer Christine Armario contributed to this report.
New earthquake, magnitude 6.1, shakes jittery Mexico | World | News | Toronto Su
Mexican rescue dog Frida gains worldwide following
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First posted: Thursday, September 28, 2017 11:09 PM EDT | Updated: Thursday, September 28, 2017 11:21 PM EDT
MEXICO CITY — Even without rescuing anyone from the rubble after Mexico’s big earthquake, a photogenic yellow Labrador retriever named Frida has gained an international social media following.
At least 344 people died in the Sept. 19 earthquake, including 205 in Mexico City. For days, rescuers who tunneled into huge mounds of debris and selfless volunteers who threw themselves into work around the city were lauded for their efforts. But no individual captured the hearts of Mexicans and those watching the efforts from afar like Frida.
Clad in goggles and neoprene booties, Frida with nose to the ground and clambering over crumbled buildings became a symbol of hope.
“In social terms, this dog functioned like a transitional object because maybe she didn’t help us in anything real or concrete — meaning she didn’t rescue anyone — but she let us feel like there was hope and that there were things that could help us,” said Fatima Laborda, a psychoanalyst and director of Casa Grana, a psychological assistance and research organization.
Laborda said Thursday that in traumatic situations, whether war or natural disaster, people tend to seek refuge in something real or symbolic as they try to regain confidence and a feeling of safety. A rescuer literally removing rocks to free you is one way to feel helped, but someone can also “feel supported by merely seeing people in the street, because that way I feel the solidarity of everyone else and that is symbolic and also can give me psychological relief.”
The 19 earthquake that shook Mexico City and nearby states was not even Frida’s first in September. She was dispatched to Juchitan, a town in Oaxaca state that sustained much damage in the magnitude 8.1 quake that struck southern Mexico on Sept. 7.
Over the course of a six-year career, Frida — 8 years old, 65 pounds and trending internet topic — has found 41 bodies and 12 people alive. She has worked quake disasters abroad as well, including in 2010 in Haiti and 2016 in Ecuador.
But she didn’t reach celebrity status until Mexico’s most recent disaster when the Mexican navy — Frida’s employer — released a video of her at work on its Twitter account.
Frida’s star rose just as another symbol of hope dissipated. For two days eyes were glued to search efforts at a collapsed school where including 19 children and seven adults died. Word spread that a girl named Frida Sofia was trapped in the rubble. But ultimately, the navy announced that she had never existed.
That left Frida the rescue dog.
Actor Chris Evans, of Captain America fame, retweeted a video of Frida at work, adding: “What did we do to deserve dogs?”
Groups of women who knit offered designs inspired by Frida on Facebook, with the earnings going to earthquake relief efforts.
No one resists Frida’s charms, including her two handlers. One of them, Emmanuel Hernandez, a marine corporal, said Frida was identified early on for having qualities of a good search dog: docility, a good instinct for hunting and strong sense of smell.
Hernandez tamped down rumours that Frida’s retirement might come soon. She remains capable and ready to work, he said.
In the future, she could transition into more of a mentoring role rather than search leader, he added. Two young Belgian malinois worked with her in Juchitan.
Whenever her retirement does come, she will be put up for adoption to navy personnel.
“If someone asks me if I would want to take Frida, I would say yes,” Hernandez said. “But we will have Frida for a long time yet.”
Journalists surround Frida, one of three Marine dogs specially trained to search for people trapped inside collapsed buildings, during a press event in Mexico City, Thursday, Sept. 28, 2017. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
Mexican rescue dog Frida gains worldwide following | World | News | Toronto Sun
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First posted: Thursday, September 28, 2017 11:09 PM EDT | Updated: Thursday, September 28, 2017 11:21 PM EDT
MEXICO CITY — Even without rescuing anyone from the rubble after Mexico’s big earthquake, a photogenic yellow Labrador retriever named Frida has gained an international social media following.
At least 344 people died in the Sept. 19 earthquake, including 205 in Mexico City. For days, rescuers who tunneled into huge mounds of debris and selfless volunteers who threw themselves into work around the city were lauded for their efforts. But no individual captured the hearts of Mexicans and those watching the efforts from afar like Frida.
Clad in goggles and neoprene booties, Frida with nose to the ground and clambering over crumbled buildings became a symbol of hope.
“In social terms, this dog functioned like a transitional object because maybe she didn’t help us in anything real or concrete — meaning she didn’t rescue anyone — but she let us feel like there was hope and that there were things that could help us,” said Fatima Laborda, a psychoanalyst and director of Casa Grana, a psychological assistance and research organization.
Laborda said Thursday that in traumatic situations, whether war or natural disaster, people tend to seek refuge in something real or symbolic as they try to regain confidence and a feeling of safety. A rescuer literally removing rocks to free you is one way to feel helped, but someone can also “feel supported by merely seeing people in the street, because that way I feel the solidarity of everyone else and that is symbolic and also can give me psychological relief.”
The 19 earthquake that shook Mexico City and nearby states was not even Frida’s first in September. She was dispatched to Juchitan, a town in Oaxaca state that sustained much damage in the magnitude 8.1 quake that struck southern Mexico on Sept. 7.
Over the course of a six-year career, Frida — 8 years old, 65 pounds and trending internet topic — has found 41 bodies and 12 people alive. She has worked quake disasters abroad as well, including in 2010 in Haiti and 2016 in Ecuador.
But she didn’t reach celebrity status until Mexico’s most recent disaster when the Mexican navy — Frida’s employer — released a video of her at work on its Twitter account.
Frida’s star rose just as another symbol of hope dissipated. For two days eyes were glued to search efforts at a collapsed school where including 19 children and seven adults died. Word spread that a girl named Frida Sofia was trapped in the rubble. But ultimately, the navy announced that she had never existed.
That left Frida the rescue dog.
Actor Chris Evans, of Captain America fame, retweeted a video of Frida at work, adding: “What did we do to deserve dogs?”
Groups of women who knit offered designs inspired by Frida on Facebook, with the earnings going to earthquake relief efforts.
No one resists Frida’s charms, including her two handlers. One of them, Emmanuel Hernandez, a marine corporal, said Frida was identified early on for having qualities of a good search dog: docility, a good instinct for hunting and strong sense of smell.
Hernandez tamped down rumours that Frida’s retirement might come soon. She remains capable and ready to work, he said.
In the future, she could transition into more of a mentoring role rather than search leader, he added. Two young Belgian malinois worked with her in Juchitan.
Whenever her retirement does come, she will be put up for adoption to navy personnel.
“If someone asks me if I would want to take Frida, I would say yes,” Hernandez said. “But we will have Frida for a long time yet.”
Journalists surround Frida, one of three Marine dogs specially trained to search for people trapped inside collapsed buildings, during a press event in Mexico City, Thursday, Sept. 28, 2017. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
Mexican rescue dog Frida gains worldwide following | World | News | Toronto Sun
Oh ferchur dude. A 'big hug' will help make things all better. Here, let me go change my avatar to a Mexican flag and I'll be a better man than Trump :lol:
You know, because sentiments and meaningless gestures solve everything.