Fresh jolt as Ecuador quake toll scales 500
Print Edition
A FRESH tremor rattled Ecuador before dawn yesterday, a magnitude-6.1 jolt that set babies crying and adults pouring into the streets, fearful of yet more damage following a monster earthquake over the weekend.
It was the strongest aftershock yet following the magnitude-7.8 quake that killed over 500 people.
The US Geological Survey said the tremor was centered offshore, 25 kilometers west of the devastated beach town of Muisne, at 3:33am local time.
The new aftershock led some people in Portoviejo to abandon homes, even those with no apparent damage, and head through the night toward a former airport where temporary shelters have been set up.
Placid Pacific coastline
Meanwhile, scenes of mourning multiplied all along Ecuador’s normally placid Pacific coastline as people began burying loved ones and hope faded that more survivors will be found. Funeral homes were running out of caskets, and local governments were paying to bring in coffins from other cities.
In the small town of Montecristi, near Manta port, two children were among those buried on Tuesday. They were killed with their mother while buying school supplies when the quake struck.
The funeral had to be held outside under a makeshift awning, because the town’s Roman Catholic church was damaged and unsafe. Family members wailed loudly and one man fainted as the children were laid to rest in an above-ground vault.
The National Prosecutors Office put the death toll at 525 yesterday — up from a previous official toll of 507 — but officials expected more bodies to be found, with the Defense Department reporting on Tuesday that more than 200 people were still missing.
The office said on its official Twitter account yesterday that there were at least 11 foreigners among the dead. It said that of the 525 fatalities, 15 people remained unidentified but none was foreign.
The office said 435 of the dead were found in the Manta, Portoviejo and Pedernales areas. The final toll could surpass casualties from earthquakes in Chile and Peru in the past decade.
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