The Chilean government yesterday scrambled to provide aid to thousands of homeless in coastal towns devastated by a massive earthquake and tsunamis as 10,000 troops moved into stricken areas to quell looting.
The government sharply raised the death toll to 711 from Saturday’s 8.8-magnitude quake as harrowing scenes of destruction emerged in isolated towns swamped by the giant waves that were triggered by one of the strongest earthquakes in a century.
With many people missing and some communities in the worst-hit central region of the South American country still largely cut off by mangled roads, Chilean President Michelle Bachelet said the death toll was certain to rise.
Surging waves ruined houses and smashed cars in fishing villages on the country's long Pacific coast. In the town of Constitucion alone, 350 people were reported to have died and a public gym was turned into a makeshift morgue.
“The tsunami destroyed almost everything on the seafront [and] the center of the town was completely destroyed. This means lots of people still haven’t been accounted for,” Constitucion Mayor Hugo Tilleria told state TV, surrounded by the twisted wreckage of flattened homes.
A night-time curfew went into effect in the Maule region and the heavily damaged town of Concepcion, where hundreds of looters ransacked stores for food and other goods. Looting also broke out in parts of the capital, Santiago.
“We don’t have water or anything. No one has appeared with help and we need more police to keep order. There are many people here who are robbing,” said a 78-year-old woman who identified herself as Ana in the badly hit city of Talca, 250km south of Santiago.
In Concepcion, angry survivors camping along roads took out their frustration on firefighters who were distributing drinking water in thermoses and tea kettles, damaging their vehicles. Police arrested scores of people for looting and violating the curfew.
Copper prices surged to a five-week high in early trading owing to supply worries, jumping 5.6 percent to US$7,600 per tonne on the London Metal Exchange before easing to US$7,460. The markets may help clarify the extent of the economic impact on Latin America’s most developed country and the world's biggest copper exporter.
Damage from the quake could cost up to US$30 billion, equivalent to about 15 percent of Chile’s GDP, said Eqecat, a firm that helps insurers model catastrophe risks.
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