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Venezuela's Twin Earthquakes Kill 920 as Delcy Rodríguez Faces Her First Crisis

Twin magnitude-7.2 and 7.5 earthquakes struck Venezuela's northern coast on June 24, killing at least 920 people, while exposing the country's shattered infrastructure and posing the biggest political test yet for acting President Delcy Rodríguez.

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Venezuela's Twin Earthquakes Kill 920 as Delcy Rodríguez Faces Her First Crisis
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Venezuela's century-defining disaster

Back-to-back earthquakes of magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 struck Venezuela's northern coast on June 24 within seconds of each other, flattening apartment blocks across Caracas and the port city of La Guaira and triggering what has become the country's deadliest seismic disaster in more than a century.english +1 By Friday, the official death toll had climbed to at least 920, with 3,360 people injured and tens of thousands reported missing.theguardian +1 The last comparable earthquake to strike the Caracas region was a magnitude 6.7 tremor in 1967 that killed more than 200 people.english

The destruction is concentrated in La Guaira, the coastal gateway to the capital, where dozens of apartment blocks pancaked under the force of the tremors.theguardian Rescue teams found a city overwhelmed: residents in some areas spent the first 36 hours digging through rubble with bare hands and basic tools, waiting in vain for emergency crews.theguardian "It has 15 floors. Or rather, it used to have them, because there's nothing left of it now," said Rotny Bombart, a paramedic searching for his missing mother in a collapsed high-rise.theguardian

A government caught flat-footed

The earthquakes have become the defining test of acting President Delcy Rodríguez, who assumed power after Nicolás Maduro was removed in January.nytimes +1 Rodríguez declared a nationwide state of emergency and urged medical staff to report for duty as hospitals struggled to cope.english But the government's response has drawn fierce criticism. "It seems they weren't prepared at all," said Orlando Pérez, a Latin America expert at the University of North Texas at Dallas. "Natural disasters reveal the true capabilities of a government. And it seems that the government has been caught flat-footed completely."theguardian

Decades of economic mismanagement under Maduro, Venezuela's near-total collapse of public health infrastructure, and the emigration of nearly 8 million Venezuelans — including doctors, engineers, and civil protection experts — have all stripped the country of the capacity to respond to a disaster of this scale.theguardian Venezuela holds the world's largest proven oil reserves, yet many of its hospitals lack basic equipment and medication.theguardian

International rescue pours in

More than 1,600 foreign rescue workers had arrived by Saturday, including teams from the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain, Colombia, Mexico, France and Turkey.jpost +1 The U.S. defence secretary Pete Hegseth mobilised troops and rescue crews from Virginia and California on President Trump's orders.theguardian An airport structural assessment temporarily closed Venezuela's main international terminal, but aid flights have continued.english

The disaster is also a geopolitical moment: Washington has been cultivating a rapprochement with Rodríguez's interim government, and analysts say the Trump administration's swift and visible response reflects that diplomatic investment — even as the earthquake lays bare how little has changed inside Venezuela itself.nytimes +1