QUITO, Ecuador (AP) – The strongest earthquake to hit Ecuador in decades flattened buildings and buckled highways along the country’s coast, killing at least 41 people and causing damage hundreds of miles (kilometers) away from the epicenter in the capital and other major cities.
The death toll was expected to rise on Sunday as rescuers reached the sparsely populated area of fishing ports and tourist beaches where the magnitude-7.8 quake was centered.
“We’re trying to do the most we can but there’s almost nothing we can do,” said Gabriel Alcivar, mayor of Pedernales, a town of 40,000 near the epicenter. He pleaded for authorities to send earth-moving machines and rescuers as dozens of buildings in the town were flattened, trapping residents among the rubble. He said looting broke out amid the chaos but that authorities were too busy trying to save lives to assert order.
“This wasn’t just a house that collapsed, it was an entire town,” he said.
Vice President Jorge Glas said in a televised address late Saturday that there were initial reports of 41 dead in the cities of Manta, Portoviejo and Guayaquil – all several hundred kilometers (miles) from where the quake struck shortly after nightfall.