A group of neighbors watched on Sunday the coffins of three women who died crushed when the house of blocks and wood where they were living collapsed in a fishing village on the Ecuadorian coast shaken by the powerful earthquake the day before, which left destruction in the Andean country. 14 dead and one victim in neighboring Peru.
The three coffins were placed under a tent on a street in Puerto Bolívar, in the city of Machala, El Oro province, where most of the deaths occurred (12). Two other deceased children, relatives of the three women, were taken for burial in another area of Machala.
Yajaira Albarracín, Graciela Chila, Silvina Zambrano Chila and the minors Rosmery Cheme and Isidoro Cheme died in that crowded sector, called April 4. Rescuers found them together, holding each other under the wooden and block structure of what was their home.
Although the sun shone with all its splendor, the city with coasts facing the Pacific remains with obvious traces of the tragedy, glass and some debris still remain in the streets while the municipal machinery is determined to clean up.
The leader of that neighborhood, René Carrasco, in statements to the Machala newspaper Correo, indicated that he expects help from the State and the political parties, “now we need your help, not that they come to embrace us in the campaign.”
Luis Becerra, from Machala, in statements by telephone to the Associated Press, assured that “you feel the pain, the drama, wherever you go, everyone is alert, with great fear in case there is an aftershock. The city is silent, fear and mourning are felt”.
The magnitude 6.8 tremor, according to the United States Geological Survey, left 14 dead in Ecuador and a girl dead in Peru, as well as hundreds injured, around 180 houses affected —84 of them completely destroyed— and numerous buildings collapsed. in vastly different communities, from the coastal zone to the Ecuadorian highlands.
The government declared in emergency the roads in the province of Azuay, in the southern highlands of Ecuador, which resulted in 13 blockades due to the earthquake and which also previously had problems caused by the harsh winter that affects a large part of the country.
Hamilton Cedillo, who lives in the center of Machala, assured the AP that they have agreed on an evacuation plan and that they are watching videos of how to protect themselves against a new earthquake, “we hardly slept because of fear.”
In Ecuador, regardless of geography, many of the houses that collapsed had a lot in common: they were inhabited by poor people, they were old, and they did not meet building regulations in the country, which is prone to earthquakes.
The quake was centered on the Pacific coast, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Guayaquil, Ecuador’s second-largest city. Hours later, another earthquake of magnitude 4.2 was felt, according to the Geophysical Institute of Peru.
The architect and builder from Quito, Germán Narváez, told the AP that the houses most affected during the seismic movements are those with poor construction, lacking foundations, structure and technical design.
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