Pisco, Peru – Hungry earthquake survivors ransacked a public market Friday, while other mobs looted a refrigerated trailer and blocked aid trucks, prompting Peru’s president to appeal for calm. Aid finally arrived to the disaster zone after about 36 hours without much help.
Few buildings still stood in the fishing city of Pisco on Friday in the wake of a magnitude-8 earthquake that killed 510 people. Many of the structures not reduced to rubble were rickety deathtraps waiting to fall.
President Alan Garcia, on the scene for the second straight day, vowed that no one would die of hunger or thirst.
Garcia predicted “a situation approaching normality” in 10 days but acknowledged reconstruction would take far longer.
Two sunrises after the earthquake that all but leveled this city of 90,000 people on Peru’s desert southern coast, workers continued to pull bodies from rubble, the region lacked water and electricity, and officials began to worry about the outbreak of disease.
The death count stood at 510, according to Peru’s fire department, and hopes of finding more survivors diminished. At least 1,500 people suffered injuries, and Garcia said 80,000 people had lost loved ones, homes or both.
Brig. Maj. Jorge Vera, chief of the rescue operation, said 85 percent of Pisco’s downtown was rubble.
Police identified bodies, and civil defense teams ferried in food. Housing officials assessed the need for new homes, and in several towns long lines formed under an intense sun to collect water from soldiers.
In the capital of Lima, Peruvians donated tons of supplies as food, water, tents and blankets began arriving in the quake zone.
