Families wait beside rubble as Venezuela quake toll climbs and survivors trapped

Families stood beside collapsed apartments and office blocks in La Guaira and Caracas, calling out to relatives they feared were still alive under the rubble. Nearly three days after two powerful earthquakes struck Venezuela on June 24, hundreds were trapped, many more were unaccounted for, and the weight of broken concrete and twisted steel made every hour slower than the last.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs put the quakes at about magnitude 7.2 and 7.5, and they hit northern Venezuela within about a minute of each other around 6 p.m. local time. More than 20 aftershocks followed, turning already unstable buildings into a second threat for people digging through the remains of homes and apartment towers.

Early official counts on June 25 listed 32 dead and more than 700 injured. By June 26 and June 27, the toll had climbed sharply in later reporting, with some counts crossing 900 dead and others putting the number above 1,400 as search crews and residents kept pulling through debris. The worst damage was in La Guaira state, with heavy destruction also in Caracas and in the surrounding states of Aragua, Carabobo, Falcón and Miranda.

Mexican soldiers joined the effort, and urban search-and-rescue specialists from Miami-Dade County, Los Angeles County and Fairfax County were deployed to help reach people believed to be alive under the ruins.

In neighborhoods from Maiquetía to Caracas, families kept waiting beside broken masonry and hollowed-out walls.

UNICEF estimated that 3.9 million children live in the areas hit by the earthquakes.