News from Chile: Earthquake 2017

Earthquake in Chile, February 27, 2010

Dozens of people have asked about my friends Susaan Straus and Ricardo Ceriani, whom I've visited - and written about -  for two weeks every January for the past five years. They live in Chile from November to May every year.

First of all, they are safe. Their little town of Nogales is 600 miles north of Concepcion, the epicenter of the 8.8 earthquake. They’ve been without electricity and running water from the day of the earthquake until a few hours ago.

Susaan agreed to let me send along emails she managed to send me intermittently during the last two weeks, when she was  able to find WiFi access in La Calera, a small city about ten miles from their home in Nogales, Chile. Ricardo was born in Quillota, about twenty miles from Nogales.

First message received March 1.
March 1 (3 days after the quake)
"Yes, we're fine, property damage only, but what an adventure. We just tonight thought we got our electricity, internet and water back on - but alas we've lost it all again - don't know when this message will actually "send".  We've been getting our drinking water from the stream, and Ricardo's been bathing in the pool which is now full of soap! Too cold for me, so I'm just being dirty!"

"I've been in these earthquakes here before but this one was different. It kept getting stronger, and lasted forever - well, a full minute, but when everything is jiggling and roaring like an oncoming train, when the lights have flashed off and you're in the dark, and everything that you'd placed on every shelf in the house is crashing all around you, it sure seems like forever!  It opened all our windows and shook half the grout out of the shower."

"The bridge into Nogales over Rt 5 has been closed because it has big open spaces in it. The Nogales and Melon pedestrian bridges crossing Rt 5 came down onto the highway,and the aftershocks were endless, but all in all, we lucked out - as you can see from these photos from our neighborhood that I've attached."

"Just a little bit of property damage, some real inconvenience with no water or means of communication (no cell service either) for 3 days, and we lost everything in the refrigerator, but we're fine, and so is Ricardo's family.  We don't even know what's really going on in the south - we have no TV or radio - so we're pretty isolated... What an experience!"

"Here's our bridge to Nogales over Rt 5."



"This bridge sidewalk used to be a straight line."


"This is the pedestrian bridge near us that came down - actually the 2 nearest us fell onto the highway."

"Remember the wall in Ricardo's family house in Quillota? - his father built it long ago."

"We are about 600 miles north of Concepcion where this huge quake was centered.  We got off really easy. You can imagine how powerful the quake was to do all this 600 miles away.  Our thoughts are with the folks who got the worst of it."

Second message March 5
"Still without power/phone/water/internet.  But the good news is Le Central in La Calera has WiFi - Ricardo is enjoying his completos.  Because I have a connection now, I've just started seeing pictures of the devastation and hearing about it from chilespouses (Susaan’s friends throughout Chile)..  Terrible.

Third message March 8
We're still getting aftershocks today. To sense what the aftershocks feel like, imagine you're in  small sailboat  and a very big dingy bumps into the boat a few times.  Kind of a bump, a lurch, and then back to normal." 

"The aftershocks are quiet, but the earthquake was roaring - you can tell the big ones are coming because you hear them before you feel them."

"It helped to be protected from the images, the reality, of the disaster unfolding to the south of us.  But now we have our TV back and are seeing it full bore.  We in the US could take some lessons from these Chileans.  The country mobilizes itself - doesn't wait for the government - people jump in their cars and trucks, hit up their neighbors and local businesses for supplies and drive down to the effected area - at least as close as they could get, some roads and bridges are impassable."

Fourth message March 9
"Hi!  I'm at my WiFi station in La Calera having tea.  Let Warren know that this was our most serious fear - that no water for a week would damage the orange crop. We're back in business with the pumps now and our agronomist has counseled us on how to ease back into the water for the trees. He says we should be OK. Phew."

"We now have electricity - but still no phone.  It was great to take a hot shower.  
RE your question about what we ate: We didn't so much eat things right away, as cook things (gas) that I had on hand - lots of beans and stuff from the garden."

"The big stores were closed for a few days after the quake - cleaning up the aisles of the broken merchandise - but they've been open and after the first day, there was no crush. Things are back to normal in our area, though heavy earth moving equipment is working to remove the rubble from the houses (old) that didn't survive."

"I have some newer photos, but they're still in the camera - things are getting fixed, though we probably won't have the phone/internet for another week. Thanks for staying in touch, my friend!"

Fifth message March 10
"I went to a meeting of our bookclub in Santiago on Sunday and one of the gringas has married into an old Chilean family. After the quake, her husband went to the city of their ancestral home, Talca, where his mother had been buried 2 years ago to see that everything was OK." 

"Background: in Chile, the dead are not buried, but their coffins are placed in mausoleums made of cement.  These structures stand several meters tall with the dead in 'drawers' built into the structure. When the husband arrived in Talca, he found that the mausoleum crumbled, the coffins were open and strewn about, and he found himself viewing the remains of his mother."

"At the end of this message I've attached a pdf from a chilespouse who is a geologist working for the mining companies. Background on what went on."
"In the week since the quake, the cracks in bridges and roads have continued to appear."

"Here are the wires, coiled and ready for repair, that snapped as the poles wiggled back and forth."

"As the electricity was being repaired, somehow a surge caused the transformer on our road to explode igniting the brush under the wires and frying whatever was left of the telephone cables.  Every day Ricardo calls the phone company and every day they say, you'll have your phone by 9 pm tonight.  So far, nada."

March 10

pt Question
You said you heard the quake coming, yes? What did it sound like?
S answer
"In the beginning it sounds like the tractor starting up in the barn.  A low rumble.  Then it gets louder and at the height it sounds like a train.  It's really loud.  Imagine a mammoth plate of the earth scraping along against another plate.  Not quiet!"

pt Question
The grout shook out from tile in bathroom, did your bed shake, furniture move, structure of house shake?
S answer 
"All of the above."

pt Question
Is all countryside around you w/o electric or just  your neighborhood? Is it b/c lines are down or power plants are offline?
S answer
"We were ALL - as in all of Regions 5,6,and 7 the whole center of Chile - without power for the first few days.  Then gradually sections came back.  Our area, La Pena, was among the last in Region V.  BOTH lines down and power plants off line at the start.  Also cell phone services off line.  Nothing worked. Nada."
   
"We just now got the phone back - and internet.  Back to normal."

Comments

[Gerard M. McMahon]

PT,
Thank you for the update, I am glad they are both well. Send them my best.
Gerard

[Mark W.]

Dear Paul,

Thank you (as always) for the moving account from Chile.
My heart just goes out to those people. Things are tough enough in life without the earth crumbling beneath your feet, or your roof collapsing on your head.

We're trying to support some friends who do charitable work in Haiti.

We'll keep your friends in our prayers. I hope it helps.

[Shelley]

Thanks for the update, PT. Sounds pretty stressful but I guess not nearly as harrowing as for those much closer to the "center of the action." So glad all's well with them

[Kim]

fascinating.... so glad they're okay....

[Carolyn Liesy]

I am so glad to have this information. It is all very interesting. Glad Susaan and Ricky are OK. Great job assembling the info for the post.

[Alice]

Very powerful.