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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
Environment
Sam Levin

230 confirmed dead as Mexico earthquake rescue efforts continue – as it happened

The latest

Search continues for survivors in La Condesa

Reporter Nina Lakhani returned late Wednesday to La Condesa neighbourhood in Mexico City, which suffered severe damage in the earthquake:

The scene around the seven-story collapsed apartment block on Amsterdam Avenue in La Condesa could not be more different than the chaos of yesterday when hundreds of people clambered onto the rubble trying to find survivors.

Tonight, order has been restored to the search-and-rescue mission largely thanks to volunteer neighbours who have cordoned off every possible entrance to the excavation area in order to regulate who comes in and out.

Lizbeth Yazmin Lopez, a computer software retailer, stood guard next to heavily armed soldiers and used a black marker pen to write the blood group and emergency contact number of every person granted permission to enter. “We had to do something to stop people just coming here to stare rather than help,” said Lopez.

Inside the cordoned off area, there were around 200 search and rescue workers, including dog handlers, civil protection officers, medical staff and officials with the army, navy and federal police. There were still lots of volunteers, but they were supporting rather than leading efforts by organizing food, equipment and the missing persons list, and helping move debris.

Around eight families have registered missing people here, but so far only one survivor has been rescued, according to volunteers on the scene. They said a man, between 40 and 50 years old, was pulled out earlier today in critical condition and taken to the hospital. Three other bodies have been found, the volunteers said.

But there is still hope. There was total silence while rescue workers used a sensor to painstakingly identify possible human activity. A rescue dog was then sent in, and as a result, two areas were identified and marked with green painted circles where digging will be targeted over the next few hours despite the pouring rain.

Updated

Rescue mission ongoing at Rébsamen school

Our reporter on the ground, David Agren, has learned that the applause from rescue groups earlier was premature, and that trapped students at the Enrique Rébsamen have not been successfully pulled out from the rubble.

It’s unclear how many children have been pulled out alive and how many survivors may still be trapped. The rescue efforts are continuing as Mexico City heads towards nightfall. At the collapsed school, officials have issued an urgent call for lamps, oxygen tanks, medicine and thermal blankets, according to Agren:

Here is full dramatic footage of a rescue earlier in the day of two young children:

And some more recently released videos and photos of other rescue operations:

Updated

Death toll rises to 230

Federal authorities in Mexico are reporting that the death toll has now increased to 230, with 100 confirmed dead in Mexico City.

Successful rescues, however, are ongoing. Reports suggest that one 77-year-old man, José Luis Ponce, was recently pulled from the rubble after spending more than 24 hours trapped in a partially collapsed apartment building.

Luis Carlos Herrera Tome, a 12-year-old who escaped the Enrique Rébsamen school alive, recounted the harrowing experience in an interview with the Associated Press:

“I saw that the ceiling started to break apart so I turned around,” he said.

“I grabbed my friends and we took off running,” he added, showing how they linked arms. They ran together for another staircase. The building continued shaking violently and one friend fell on the stairs.

“It moved a lot. I braced myself and cleared like five stairs in one jump,” he said.

Luis Carlos’ 7-year-old brother, Jose Raul Herrera Tome, also escaped alive from another building in the school. Their mother, Norma Tome, recounted the aftermath to a reporter:

“’Mom, I saw a girl go down because she was crushed,’” Tome recalled her younger son telling her after he escaped the building. “He cried a lot for that and said, ‘I couldn’t save her.’”

When Jose Raul made it to the street he looked back at the school and said, “My brother, my brother,” Tome said.

The brothers hugged when they found each other across the street.

“We cried. He was my biggest worry,” Luis Carlos said.

Read the full account here. Here are some recent images from the ongoing rescue efforts at the school:

The latest

More details from Guardian reporter David Agren on the rescue effort at the collapsed Rébsamen school:

Police said officers were using a special thermal camera to try and locate survivors:

White House says it's offering assistance

The White House has released a bit more detail about Donald Trump’s call with president Enrique Peña Nieto, but not much. Officials said Trump offered “condolences for the lives lost and damage caused” and further “offered assistance and search-and-rescue teams, which are being deployed now”.

Trump “pledged to continue close coordination with Mexico as the two countries respond to the recent earthquakes and hurricanes”, the statement added.

And more details from the US Agency for International Development, which says it will conduct “damage assessments” and coordinate with “local authorities and aid groups to bring critical assistance to local people”:

The US Disaster Assistance Response Team (Dart) includes an urban search-and-rescue team from the Los Angeles county fire department as well as federal experts with the office of US foreign disaster assistance.

Updated

Successful rescue reported at school

There appears to be some good news at the collapsed Enrique Rebsámen school. Reporter David Agren, who is on the scene, says applause has just broken out and that officials are reporting that there has been a successful rescue.

There is lots of fist pumping, including from a worker on top of the rubble being piled into a dump truck, and an ambulance has just arrived, according to Agren. Some are reporting that it appears two have been rescued:

Rescue teams continue to dig people out from under the rubble, in some cases recovering survivors who have stayed alive for nearly a day since the earthquake hit.

Reuters has more on the rescue tactics:

Emergency crews, volunteers and bystanders toiled on Wednesday using dogs, cameras, motion detectors and heat-seeking equipment to detect victims who may still be alive more than 24-hours after the quake...

Hundreds of neighbors and emergency workers pulled rubble from the ruins of the school with their bare hands under the glare of floodlights a full day after the shock. Three survivors were found at around midnight as volunteer rescue teams known as “moles” crawled deep under the rubble.”

And more on the efforts to save a young girl from the rubble at the Enrique Rebsámen school in Mexico City:

Television stations broadcast the nailbiting, hours-long rescue attempt live after crews at the school in the south of the city reported seeing the girl move her hand. They threaded a hose through debris to get her water.

The girl’s name was not made public, but her family waited in anguish nearby.

Rescuers moved slowly, erecting makeshift wooden scaffolding to prevent rubble from crumbling further and seeking a path to the child through the unstable ruins. They implored bystanders to be quiet to better hear calls for help.

Parents still waiting at collapsed school

Reporter David Agren has an update from the site of the collapsed Enrique Rebsámen school in Mexico City where some parents are still clinging to rumors that there may be more survivors:

When Silverio Pérez reached the ruined school, he could still hear the screams coming from the children trapped beneath the shattered concrete.

Dozens of people – students and teachers – were still inside the Enrique Rebsámen school when Tuesday’s magnitude-7.1 earthquake rocked Mexico City, reducing the three-storey building to mound of rubble and twisted metal.

Like many other neighbours, Pérez, a lawyer, rushed to the scene and started digging at the wreckage with his bare hands. “I heard kids crying when I got there and saw them hurt. Badly,” said Pérez, bleary-eyed and disheveled after working through the night.

Read his full account here:

Death toll revised to 223

Officials have revised the total death count from 225 to 223 confirmed fatalities. Luis Felipe Puente, the national civil defense coordinator who has been providing official updates, tweeted the new figure at 3.15pm local time:

That’s 93 in Mexico City, 69 in Morelos state, 43 in Puebla, 13 in the State of Mexico, four in Guerrero and one in Oaxaca.

More official information from the civil defense coordinator:

Updated

Enrique Peña Nieto visits Jojutla

President Enrique Peña Nieto has arrived in Jojutla, a small town in the state of Morelos, where he is visiting the worst affected areas and will coordinate relief and rescue efforts with the state government and armed forces.

The municipality of Jojutla, which is situated 90km south of the capital, has around 55,000 inhabitants across several small towns. It was close to the epicentre of the 7.1 tremor and is one of the hardest hit areas outside of Mexico City.

At least 14 people are confirmed dead, 300 homes and businesses destroyed and around 1,500 more damaged by the earthquake, the mayor said. No building in the town centre escaped damage, according to the national newspaper Universal. Many buildings are unstable and at risk of collapse.

Pleas for urgent help for rescue teams, volunteers, blankets, medical and food supplies, were made by Morelos residents on social media last night.

Mexico is using soccer stadiums as relief centers following the earthquake, including Mexico City’s Estadio Azteca, according to the AP. The Estadio Azteca was scheduled to host a match between Chivas and America on Saturday and a November National Football League game between the New England Patriots and the Oakland Raiders.

Mexican league president Enrique Bonilla told Fox Sports that “it is a complex decision and all the facts are needed” before a decision is made about scheduling.

Officials have said there was no major damage to the stadium.

Calls for help in Xochimilco

This morning, calls for urgent help were made on social media for Xochimilco, one of Mexico City’s poorest areas, where some reports suggested that numerous people are trapped under collapsed buildings in the San Marcos, San Gregorio and Santa Cruz Acalpixca communities.

Sergio Aguyo, a political analyst, wrote on Twitter: “Xochimilco needs help, provisions and volunteers. There are important damages and no support has arrived.”

Actor Gael García Bernal also posted tweets asking for help:

Within hours, people from all walks of life had mobilized and started arriving with much-needed medical supplies and food:

Updated

Here are some more details on the ongoing rescue efforts at the at the Enrique Rebsamen school in southern Mexico City, where one child was found alive. The AP spoke to volunteer rescue worker Pedro Serrano, who managed to crawl into crevices of the pile of rubble at the school. He made it into a classroom, but found everyone inside dead:

We saw some chairs and wooden tables. The next thing we saw was a leg, and then we started to move rubble and we found a girl and two adults — a woman and a man...

We can hear small noises, but we don’t know if they’re coming from ... the walls above, or someone below calling for help.”

Some workers said Wednesday morning that a teacher and two students had sent text messages from within the rubble, according to Reuters. Adriana D‘Fargo, 32, had been waiting hours for news of her seven-year-old, telling a reporter: “They keep pulling kids out, but we know nothing of my daughter.”

Updated

Mexico City: 52 pulled alive from rubble

Mexico City mayor Miguel Ángel Mancera has reported that 52 people have been pulled alive from the rubble of collapsed buildings. He said the death toll in Mexico City was 93, slightly lower than the figure the federal government announced earlier.

He also said at least 38 buildings have been reduced to rubble.

Updated

Here’s some footage of the destruction and ongoing rescue operations in Mexico City.

Are the two earthquakes related?

Are Mexico’s two earthquakes in less than two weeks related? Could they indicate that more tremors are on the way? Guardian science correspondent Hannah Devlin has details:

Both quakes occurred on the Cocos tectonic plate, which runs along the western coast of Mexico, and is sliding beneath the neighbouring North American tectonic plate to the north-east at a rate of about three inches per year...

“What happened yesterday was most likely a tearing motion in the subducting Cocos plate,” says Prof David Rothery of the Open University.

A similar mechanism is thought to be responsible for the earlier recent quake, but seismologists do not think that one led to the other. Stephen Hicks, of the University of Southampton, said: “It’s quite a long way for them to be directly linked. It might have slightly increased the stress, but if it did it’s a tiny amount and the fault must have been close to rupturing anyway.”

Read the full story here:

Updated

If you’ve been affected by the earthquake and would like to share your story, you can contribute using the form here. You can also share pictures and videos by clicking on the blue Contribute button on this article, or via WhatsApp by adding the contact +44(0)7867825056. We’d also like to hear from people who are helping in the rescue and relief effort.

Your stories will help our journalists have a more complete picture of these events and we will use them in our reporting.

Your safety is most important, so please ensure that you’re taking this into account when recording or sharing your content.

Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto declared three days of national mourning to honor earthquake victims.

The Twitter account of the office of the president announced the declaration, writing: “Mexico shares your pain.”

Here is the latest from Peña Nieto, who has offered his gratitude to volunteers and government officials and said that the priority remains rescuing people from collapsed structures: “Every minute counts.”

Updated

Donald Trump calls Enrique Peña Nieto

US president Donald Trump had a “lengthy call” with president Enrique Peña Nieto on Wednesday, according to the White House. Brock Long, administrator of the US Federal Emergency Management Agency, was also on the call, but there were few other details released about the discussions.

Trump faced backlash for his delayed communications with Mexico following the first earthquake earlier this month. The US president offered condolences to Peña Nieto one week after that earthquake hit and claimed that he had been unable to reach him for several days because of bad mobile phone reception.

It is customary for US officials to send condolences after natural disasters, and the initial lack of communication from the White House was particularly controversial given that Mexico had recently offered to help aid the US in its hurricane disaster recovery.

Mexican journalist León Krauze has written in the Washington Post today about the need for Trump to put his grudges aside and support Mexico during this devastating tragedy:

Trump should, for once, follow the words and deeds of Ronald Reagan and prove that, despite his long, unfair and very public confrontation with Mexico and its citizens on both sides of the border, America’s better angels (and perhaps Trump’s own as well) always prevail in the face of unspeakable tragedy. Nativist prejudice should find its limits in sudden human suffering. The alternative would be cruel and, yes, un-American.

Updated

Firsthand accounts of the rescues

Guardian readers have sent in their accounts and photos of the ongoing devastation and rescue missions. Luis, an aviation worker who lives in Mexico City, was one of the hundreds of volunteers who rallied to help those affected by the 7.1-magnitude earthquake that hit the capital on Tuesday afternoon:

I arrived at the corner of Avenue Nuevo León and Calle Laredo with some friends from work around 10pm and left at 2am. Volunteers are being coordinated into shifts of four hours. As we were leaving, more people were arriving.

We flagged down a police truck as we were making our way there on foot and they gave us a lift. People noticed we were on our way to help and would pull us over to give us water and first aid supplies. Others would show up to feed those of us working with coffee, sandwiches and tamales. The number of volunteers that have shown up to help is amazing to say the least.

Rubble is carried through long lines of volunteers towards dump trucks with power generators, donated by companies, assisting in lighting rescue zones. Silence rules apply every so often to listen for trapped victims. Buildings that were left hanging by a thread are still collapsing. A lot of people have been able to be rescued but many others are still unaccounted for.

I plan to be out there again tonight to help. It is a sad day, but also a proud day to be in Mexico City.”

Luis on the back of a truck helping out with clearing rubble in the La Condesa area of Mexico City Luis Mexico earthquake
Luis on the back of a truck helping out with clearing rubble in the La Condesa area of Mexico City Luis Mexico earthquake Photograph: Luis
A line of volunteers helping clear rubble in the La Condesa area of Mexico City Luis Mexico earthquake
A line of volunteers helping clear rubble in the La Condesa area of Mexico City Luis Mexico earthquake Photograph: Luis

Emily Moss, an economics teacher living in Mexico City, was at work when the earthquake struck. She said:

Every year the whole city does an earthquake drill at 11am and I am so thankful that the drill was fresh in my and my students’ minds when the earthquake hit. A few weeks ago the tremor we felt here was a small side to side motion, like being on a boat at sea, but yesterday was nothing like that. The ground was moving up and down and staying steady was a feat.

Although terrified I had to stay calm. Our school was extremely lucky and no teachers or students were injured. As windows and walls crumbled or fell, we had a few people grazed but nothing serious. We are so grateful for that. The school buildings were evacuated quickly and efficiently, and the response from students and staff was incredible.

After being outside for roughly four hours while waiting for parents to pick up their children, families from nearby were delivering food. I hope that when people read about what is happening the truly outstanding character of the Mexican people comes through.”

Kevin, a PhD student from Toronto who lives in the centre of Mexico City, was in Colonia Roma when he heard the earthquake alarm. He said:

There was one man who had a head injury and his white shirt was stained with blood. He seemed woozy and in shock as he came out of the building, but I saw an ambulance arrive and paramedics bandaged his head.

In the evening, my neighbour and I went to drop off masks and supplies to a school close to where I live which had partially collapsed. It was amazing to see the amount of people who were helping out; there were people dropping off bottles of water on their motorcycles and in shopping carts for those helping in the recovery effort.”

Someone being carried to safety in Colonia Roma after an earthquake hit Mexico City
Someone being carried to safety in Colonia Roma after an earthquake hit Mexico City Photograph: Kevin
People bringing water bottles for volunteers helping to clear the rubble after the earthquake in Mexico City
People bringing water bottles for volunteers helping to clear the rubble after the earthquake in Mexico City Photograph: Kevin
Relief efforts continue through the night between Bolivar and Chilmapopoca streets in Centro Historico, Mexico City after it was struck by an earthquake
Relief efforts continue through the night between Bolivar and Chilmapopoca streets in Centro Historico, Mexico City after it was struck by an earthquake Photograph: Kevin

Updated

Fatalities by region

Here’s the latest breakdown of confirmed fatalities from the head of Mexico’s national civil defense agency: 94 in Mexico City, 71 in Morelos state, 43 in Puebla, 12 in the State of Mexico, four in Guerrero and one in Oaxaca.

Updated

Child found alive at school

Rescuers said they have found a surviving child in the ruins of the school that collapsed during the earthquake. The Associated Press reports:

Helmeted workers worked at the debris, sometimes calling for silence, as they tried to reach the girl at the Enrique Rebsamen school in southern Mexico City.

Foro TV reported that rescuers spotted the child and shouted to her to move her hand if she could hear them, and she did. A search dog subsequently entered the wreckage and confirmed she was alive.

At the Rebsamen primary and secondary school, a wing of the three-story building collapsed into a pile of concrete slabs, and reporters on the scene saw rescuers bring out at least two small bodies from the rubble, covered in sheets, according to the AP.

From a reporter on the scene:

Updated

At least 225 dead after powerful Mexico earthquake

Hello and welcome. Sam Levin here taking over our live coverage of the powerful Mexico earthquake that has killed hundreds. Here’s the latest we know:

  • The 7.1-magnitude earthquake struck southern Mexico on Tuesday, 123km from Mexico City, in Puebla state.
  • At least 225 people total have been killed across the region, and rescue crews continue to search for survivors.
  • At least 20 children died in the collapse of a private school.
  • More than a dozen people were reportedly killed when a church collapsed during a mass.
  • It was the most powerful earthquake to hit the nation since a 1985 one in Mexico City killed thousands.
  • More than 40 buildings have collapsed in Mexico City.
  • Officials have reported more than 11 aftershocks, including one that reached magnitude 4.
  • The US Geological Survey has predicted that there will be up to 1,000 fatalities from the earthquake and damages between $1bn and $10bn.
  • It was the second major earthquake to hit Mexico in two weeks.

Updated

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