RELATIVES MOURN THE LOSS OF THEIR FAMILY MEMBERS, VICTIMS OF ECUADOR’S MAGNITUDE-7.8 EARTHQUAKE. THE DISASTER HAS CLAIMED 350 LIVES, A FIGURE THAT IS EXPECTED TO RISE.
• Ecuador’s president predicted Monday a “considerable” rise in the death toll from a massive earthquake whose tally already included at least 350 lives amid flattened villages along the country’s Pacific coast.
President Rafael Correa tried to lift spirits by saying the country will overcome “these very difficult moments” but also added a sobering message that the full extent of Saturday’s magnitude-7.8 quake was still unknown.
The death toll would “surely rise, and in a considerable way,” Correa said as rescue teams struggled to reach the quake zone, where some areas were cut off by landslides and buckled roads.
Ecuador’s security minister, Cesar Navas, told the Teleamazonas channel that the death count had reached at least 350.
The quake also claimed the lives of Jennifer Mawn and her 12-year-old son Arthur Laflamme, who were originally from Quebec. The boy’s father, Pascal Laflamme, and a sister, Laurie-Ann, suffered slight injuries in the quake.
In the seaside town of Pedernales, the quake’s epicentre, survivors spent the night in tents or on mattresses arranged outdoors. Broken fragments from a fresco on the town’s church were scattered nearby.
At first light, some people gathered by ruined buildings to watch firefighters and rescue crews search the rubble for victims — more than 135 from Pedernales.
Others began the work of trying to save what they could. Vicente Vera, 23, oversaw friends and relatives as they heaved bulk bags of sugar out of his uncle’s wholesale store.
“If we don’t get the stock out, it will go bad, and we’ll lose even more than we already have,” Vera said.