Rescuers found the bodies of three people who were swept out to sea by huge waves triggered by a powerful earthquake that sent avalanches crashing into a fjord in southern Chile. Seven others were missing.
While there was no tsunami, Saturday's 6.2-magnitude earthquake caused masses of rock and earth to plunge from surrounding hills into the narrow inlet, creating 8m waves.
The roaring, white-capped water destroyed boats, uprooted trees and overwhelmed beachgoers. Police Major Claudio Escobar said on Sunday that the search would continue until the seven missing people had been located.
PHOTO: AFP
A correspondent for Chilevision television, who was at the beach to install an antenna, said he saw a man and his young daughter dragged into the water by a large wave.
"There were some boats in the area and waves destroyed them," Orlando Adriazola said. "The boat we arrived in was thrown on top of a tree, partly destroyed."
The government's Emergency Bureau identified the three bodies as Ernesto Contreras, 65; his wife, Elsa Poblete, 54; and their two-year-old grandson Genaro Linay. They were found in Aysen Fjord, near the epicenter of the quake. The seven missing people weren't identified.
Meanwhile, Chilean President Michele Bachelet arrived on Sunday and was met by protests from angry residents who say the government has been slow to offer assistance following several months of seismic activity in the region.
After touring the area, Bachelet said the government would reinforce the area's health services with more doctors and ambulances, as well sending a helicopter and a power generator in case of a new emergency.
Public Works Minister Eduardo Bitran and a team of engineers were to fly to the area yesterday to check a local bridge that was damaged by the quake, she said.
Bachelet also was considering releasing emergency funds to the area, located about 2,050km south of the Chilean capital, Santiago.
Juan Cayupi, a volcanologist investigating the earthquake for the government, said it "triggered several landslides from neighboring hills into the sea, causing the level of water to rise steeply, violently, in the form of huge waves."
Cayupi, who was at the fjord at the time of the quake, said by telephone that the waters were calm on Sunday.
Saturday's early afternoon quake sent people into the streets in a panic at Puerto Aysen and Puerto Chacabuco, the closest cities to the fjord, with a combined population of 35,000.
Puerto Aysen Mayor Oscar Catalan was at the beach and saw six people being pulled away by the current, the Chilean newspaper El Mercurio said.
Far from the violence ravaging Haiti, a market on the border with the Dominican Republic has maintained a welcome degree of normal everyday life. At the Dajabon border gate, a wave of Haitians press forward, eager to shop at the twice-weekly market about 200km from Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. They are drawn by the market’s offerings — food, clothing, toys and even used appliances — items not always readily available in Haiti. However, with gang violence bad and growing ever worse in Haiti, the Dominican government has reinforced the usual military presence at the border and placed soldiers on alert. While the market continues to
An image of a dancer balancing on the words “China Before Communism” looms over Parisian commuters catching the morning metro, signaling the annual return of Shen Yun, a controversial spectacle of traditional Chinese dance mixed with vehement criticism of Beijing and conservative rhetoric. The Shen Yun Performing Arts company has slipped the beliefs of a spiritual movement called Falun Gong in between its technicolored visuals and leaping dancers since 2006, with advertising for the show so ubiquitous that it has become an Internet meme. Founded in 1992, Falun Gong claims nearly 100 million followers and has been subject to “persistent persecution” in
ONLINE VITRIOL: While Mo Yan faces a lawsuit, bottled water company Nongfu Spring and Tsinghua University are being attacked amid a rise in nationalist fervor At first glance, a Nobel prize winning author, a bottle of green tea and Beijing’s Tsinghua University have little in common, but in recent weeks they have been dubbed by China’s nationalist netizens as the “three new evils” in the fight to defend the country’s valor in cyberspace. Last month, a patriotic blogger called Wu Wanzheng filed a lawsuit against China’s only Nobel prize-winning author, Mo Yan (莫言), accusing him of discrediting the Communist army and glorifying Japanese soldiers in his fictional works set during the Japanese invasion of China. Wu, who posts online under the pseudonym “Truth-Telling Mao Xinghuo,” is seeking
‘SURPRISES’: The militants claim to have successfully tested a missile capable of reaching Mach 8 and vowed to strike ships heading toward the Cape of Good Hope Yemen’s Houthi rebels claim to have a new, hypersonic missile in their arsenal, Russia’s state media reported on Thursday, potentially raising the stakes in their attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and surrounding waterways against the backdrop of Israel’s war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The report by the state-run RIA Novosti news agency cited an unidentified official, but provided no evidence for the claim. It comes as Moscow maintains an aggressively counter-Western foreign policy amid its grinding war on Ukraine. However, the Houthis have for weeks hinted about “surprises” they plan for the battles at sea to counter the