{"id":3234,"date":"2026-06-29T07:08:40","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T07:08:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/reliablemovingcrews.com\/?p=3234"},"modified":"2026-06-29T07:08:40","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T07:08:40","slug":"capricious-violent-arbitrary-venezuelas-twin-quakes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/reliablemovingcrews.com\/?p=3234","title":{"rendered":"Capricious, violent, arbitrary: Venezuela&#8217;s twin quakes"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><div><div><ul><li>Summary<\/li><\/ul><\/div><div><\/div><\/div><div>LA GUAIRA, Venezuela, June 28 (Reuters) &#8211; I was lying on my bed, thinking about watching the Brazil soccer game \u2014 I can&#8217;t even remember who they were playing \u2014 when the bedframe started moving like a mechanical \u200bbull.<\/div><div>I pressed myself against the mattress, staring at the open window, said a blessing for my parents, closed my eyes and waited for \u200cthe ceiling to fall on me.<\/div><div>The two earthquakes that struck Venezuela early Wednesday evening were 39 seconds apart \u2014 magnitude 7.2 first and magnitude 7.5 just after.<\/div><div>Then the rattling stopped.<\/div><div>I picked up my phone and sent a message to a chat with my Reuters colleagues. The power supply held \u2014 for the moment. Elsewhere, the electricity was already gone.<\/div><div>My apartment walls had long cracks \u2014 like cat scratches \u200bon fabric.<\/div><div>The lower I descended the building&#8217;s emergency stairwell from the sixth floor, the worse the damage got.<\/div><div>On the ground floor, the glass doors had \u200bbeen shattered.<\/div><div>Outside, I had no cell signal. Anxiety crept in. I photographed neighbors in the street, nearby buildings. Then I breathed \u2060deeply and told myself that I had to go back up for my laptop and my phone charger.<\/div><div>These were the fifth and sixth earthquakes I have covered \u200bsince starting as a journalist for newswires in 1991 in Caracas.<\/div><div>All seem similar in their first moments: chaos, silence, pain, uncertainty, thousands of eyes with lost gazes absorbing \u200bwhat had happened, foreign rescue teams pouring in, governments more or less efficient at handling the emergency, delays in aid and looting. Then burials.<\/div><h2>RANDOM, INDISCRIMINATE DESTRUCTION<\/h2><div>Two days later, I go to the city of La Guaira, about a 30-minute drive from Caracas. Several of my bureau colleagues have already been, when we knew much less about what they would find on the ground. It \u200bis described by the government as the quake&#8217;s ground zero.<\/div><div>Again I was struck by the contrast.<\/div><div>In some places, we found clean streets, buildings standing, almost no one \u200bon the avenues, all bathed in the soft Caribbean morning sun.<\/div><div>Then, just one block away, buildings were reduced to rubble on both sides of the road.<\/div><div>The deeper we went into the \u200ccity&#8217;s parishes \u2014 \u2060Caraballeda, Los Corales \u2014 the more devastating the scenes. Near silence reigned in the early morning hours.<\/div><div>But as the sun rose, the noise of voices grew as did the movement of people. Swarms of motorcycles ferried aid and transported survivors amid disorder, noise and scattered crying.<\/div><div>Thousands of young people in shorts and t-shirts, some barefoot or in sandals, moved rocks from mountains of debris more than 10 meters high.<\/div><div>Some struck at concrete slabs with sledgehammers in the race to find survivors.<\/div><div>Other exhausted survivors sat motionless in \u200bplastic chairs under trees that provided some \u200brelief from the relentless heat of \u2060the Caribbean midday sun.<\/div><div>I wasn&#8217;t sure if my body could take it. We had a cooler in the car and I pressed handfuls of ice against my skin, almost bathing in it. Next time, I made a note to myself, I&#8217;d bring \u200btwo coolers.<\/div><div>Many La Guaira residents complained about the delays in the arrival of rescue equipment and food assistance. There was \u200bsome looting.<\/div><div>In the disaster \u2060zone, there&#8217;s a feeling that the rocks and the mounds of rubble do not get smaller \u2014 that they are immovable \u2014 and we begin to ask ourselves: when can this be fixed?<\/div><div>What astonishes me more than anything is the sheer virulence of tectonic violence, because it does not discriminate. It strikes equally across neighborhoods, social classes, religions. And yet it \u2060is capricious \u2014 on \u200bone side a building stands intact, and right next to it another is gone.<\/div><div>Back at home, \u200bon my night stand, untouched and upright is a glass of wine. The photos of my parents from when they were dating. A photo of my mother, already elderly, at a flower market in Caracas.<\/div><div>All \u200bof them standing.<\/div><div>I feel very fortunate.<\/div><div><address><div><div><noscript>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"120\" height=\"120\" alt=\"Vivian Sequera\" class=\"wp-image-2883\" src=\"https:\/\/reliablemovingcrews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/962fbd8cb7a32c08fc280d72eb9b0d90.avif\"\/><\/figure>\n<\/noscript><\/div><div>Vivian Sequera<\/div><\/div><div><ul><li><span><div><svg><title>Email<\/title><\/svg><\/div><\/span><\/li><li><span><div><svg><title>X<\/title><\/svg><\/div><\/span><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/address><\/div><\/div><p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/reliablemovingcrews.com\/?p=3232\">Hormuz oil exodus sets stage for chaotic rebalancing act<\/a><\/p><p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/reliablemovingcrews.com\/?p=3231\">South Korea unveils massive AI and chip investment drive<\/a><\/p><p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/reliablemovingcrews.com\/?p=3229\">Iran cyberattacks on Israel surged in 2026, Israeli cyber chief says<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thousands of young people in shorts and t-shirts, some barefoot or in sandals, moved rocks from mountains of debris more than 10 meters high.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3233,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[94,143],"class_list":["post-3234","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-americas","tag-venezuela"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - 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