CHILE / Desolation and Chaos in the Cities

Recently, a wave of earthquakes hit a series of countries. The Haiti tragedy was particularly hard, but the subsequent earthquake in Chile was even stronger, joined with a tsunami. Chile is a richer and better organized country compared with Haiti, one of the poorest countries in the world, but the earthquake consequences are still dramatic. We publish below a report by Daniel Silva, an eyewitness of the tragedy, from the days immediately after the earthquake.

Monday, March 1

Three days have passed since the earthquake. The situation has become chaotic in the most affected cities due to the lack of basic services. Meanwhile, the authorities are sending military detachments, water, food and medicines for the most stricken areas. International aid has begun to arrive: Argentina has provided three field hospitals, 54 surgeons, electrical generators and four water treatment facilities. The European Union has donated three million euros.

Media outlets register the fear in cities like Concepcion, Constitucion, Talca and Chillan, where people are attempting to protect their belongings from looters. The most chaotic location, according to records, is Concepcion, the capital of the Eighth Region, where there are reports that some mobs have broken into commercial buildings and even houses in order to steal personal items. Faced with this situation, fear has taken hold of people, even local authorities, specifically the mayor of Concepcion, Jacqueline Van Rysselberghe, who made an urgent appeal to boost the number of soldiers deployed to the zones in order to guarantee safety and see to it that emergency teams can carry out their mission without added difficulties.

There are reports that there have been escapes from some penitentiaries in the earthquake zone, which greatly increases fear and forces the population to take individual measures to protect its belongings or what remains of them.

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