Tuesday, just after noon, the furious ground began to quake all across southern central Mexico. In Ciudad Guzman, Jalisco, citizens felt a distinctive swaying of the Earth akin to that which caused so much destruction on September 19, 1985. That earthquake killed 50 people in Ciudad Guzman and left nearly 1,000 injured. Many of those caught in the throes of Tuesday’s quake can remember that devastating event. This time, however, no one has been reported dead in Cuidad Guzman, Tuxpan, San Gabriel or any of the other small communities affected in southern Jalisco.
The epicenter of this week’s disaster lay nearly 650 kilometers away on the southern border of Guerrero and Oaxaca. Officials have so far counted two deaths there. Salvador Cruz Castro, mayor of Cuajinicuilapa, a small town in the region, announced Thursday that one person died when part of a building fell during the quake and another succumbed to complications from a heart attack suffered during the tremors.
In Mexico City, where stacks of people shook together and homes and public works cracked and crumbled, Mayor Marcelo Ebrard reported no deaths as of Wednesday. He said that only two people had been reported injured in the metro area of over 20 million, one of them a bus driver when a pedestrian bridge collapsed on his vehicle. The earthquake also damaged two aqueducts and knocked out power and telephone service to several neighborhoods. Office workers streamed out of visibly swaying buildings, but thanks in part to revised building codes implemented after the 1985 disaster killed more than 10,000 people in the capital city, none of them collapsed. Because Mexico City is built on the bed of a dried up lake, the sinking clay base makes it particularly susceptible to seismic tremors.
Like many other officials, Ebrard made swift use of social media after the quake, sending out multiple messages on Twitter to keep residents informed of the situation. According to the mayor, initial estimates of damages are around 45 million pesos.
In Guerrero state, officials have counted approximately 800 homes damaged and 60 collapsed in the Costa Chica region east of Acapulco. No buildings have been reported as having collapsed in Oaxaca. This could be because that part of the country has comparatively low commercial activity and fewer tall buildings, not to mention the fact that repeated strong earthquakes in the region over the last 40 years have already knocked out all but the strongest of buildings.
In Guadalajara, officials took precautionary measures, evacuating some government buildings and the Palacio Federal. Zapopan also evacuated several of the tall buildings in the Puerta de Hierro neighborhood, though no damage has been reported at all in the metropolitan zone.
Malia Obama, daughter of the U.S. president, was vacationing in Oaxaca with friends during the quake, but Kristina Schake, the first lady’s communications director reassured the public that no harm had come to her. “In light of today’s earthquake, we can confirm that Malia Obama is safe and was never in danger,” she said.
Aftershocks of 4.9 and 5.2 were still being felt Thursday, though no new damage has been reported.