Chile Killer Quake

It was a warm summer evening, and the citizens of Santiago were strolling through parks, or gathered before TV sets or driving home after the final weekend of the traditional vacation period. Suddenly, the earth began to shake. First came one tremor and then, two minutes later, another even more intense. Buildings shuddered, chunks of concrete rained down on the streets, cars were bounced around. The front walls of the city hall and the Municipal Theater collapsed. Many of the capital’s aging churches and public buildings began to cave in. In panic, people streamed into the streets carrying mattresses, televisions, stereos and clothing; thousands stayed outside all night, waiting for the aftershocks to end.

Altogether, the quake shook an area stretching more than 1,000 miles along Chile’s mountainous spine both north and south of Santiago. At its epicenter, near the village of Algarrobo, it officially measured more than 8 on the Richter scale; geologists compared it in magnitude with the disastrous 1960 Chile quake, which killed almost 6,000. In some places, including the port of San Antonio, three-quarters or more of the buildings were no longer habitable. In San Bernardo, five died when a church wall collapsed on a Roman Catholic $ congregation. Said Juan Andres Bravo, who had been helping serve Mass when the tremor struck: “It was a scene from Dante’s Inferno. Horrible.”

Throughout the quake zone, streets were littered with shattered masonry. Some of the more than 150,000 people left homeless by the tragedy were camped in parks, streets and stadiums. By week’s end 145 had been confirmed dead and nearly 2,000 were injured. According to one government estimate, the cost of the earthquake damage could amount to as much as $2 billion. The government of President Augusto Pinochet, which had been meeting in the southern city of Punta Arenas, hurried back to the capital and announced emergency aid for those most severely affected by the quake. But for many Chileans, who are still suffering from the effects of a severe economic slump two years ago, the tragedy was overwhelming. Asked Manuel Rubilar, a janitor who earns $25 a month: “Why us? My God, why us?”