Life slowly returning to normal in quake-hit Chile
AFP
April 5, 2014, 5:47 am
Iquique (Chile) (AFP) - Life was gradually returning to normal in quake-hit Chile officials said Friday, with power restored to a majority of homes that lost electricity during this week's massive 8.2 magnitude temblor.
Tuesday's earthquake killed six people and forced thousands to evacuate, especially in coastal areas vulnerable to flooding and tsunamis.
Now, three days later, northern Chile had power and other basic services well on the way to being fully restored, according to regional power companies.
Officials said water service also was running again in many areas that had seen disruptions.
General Miguel Alfonso, head of the disaster zone, said water service was at nearly normal level in most areas, and that he expected normal food and energy distribution will be possible within about three weeks.
Recurring aftershocks have intruded, however.
A series of smaller, but still powerful quakes have shaken the country since Tuesday -- including a 7.6-magnitude temblor on Wednesday that forced thousands to flee their homes again.
Many families still slept outside Thursday into Friday, and were likely to continue to do so, as the aftershocks continue to rattle the country.
Officials said the hardest hit victims from Tuesday's quakes were inhabitants of desert towns and villages who reside in the highland plateaus where water sometimes is already scarce.
The fragile construction of dwellings in these areas puts residents at greater risk from building collapse during a quake, they said.
President Michelle Bachelet's new government, meanwhile, issued a warning to those seeking to profit from the misfortune, vowing aggressive prosecution against speculators.
Bachelet also has deployed troops to deter looting, but her government said no arrests had been made as of early Friday.
Residents of Iquique, a city of some 180,000 people which was hardest hit by the quake, had complained of price gouging as they tried to buy water and staple food products.
The earthquake hit Chile just weeks after Bachelet began her second term in office.
The political stakes were regarded as particularly high because of missteps during her first administration's response to an 8.8 magnitude quake in 2010.
That disaster left more than 500 people dead, and resulted in some 30 million dollars in damages.
Bachelet this week re-ordered her calendar to devote full attention to the quake, the first major challenge of her new adminstration.
She returned on Thursday to Santiago after surveying the quake zone, holding meetings with her cabinet to discuss what steps should be taken next in the relief and rebuilding effort.
The disaster has led her to push to one side, for now, her ambitious agenda of economic and educational reform.
"It could be that some areas will need a bit more time, because we have to focus our efforts on repair and rebuilding," she said on Friday.
Overall damage from the quake was less extensive than initially feared, proving the benefits of stringent construction standards and exhaustive disaster preparedness measures in this earthquake-prone nation.
Those standards were put in place after a massive 9.5 magnitude quake in 1960 killed thousands of Chileans and left huge swaths of the country in ruins.
By contrast, much of this week's earthquake damage was limited to some 2,500 homes outside of Iquique, according to officials.
