In half a minute, death took the lives of thousands of people in the early hours of the morning. Wednesday February 4. The greatest damage occurred in eight colonies in zone 3, in the El Gallito sector. The colonies devastated by the natural phenomenon were Santa Lucía, El Milagro, Trinidad, Buena Vista, Santa Isabel, the two that bear the name of El memoria, El Esfuerzo and La Bendiciones, from which numerous bodies were extracted.
The exact number of dead has not been established because they are still searching underground in a large area of the ravine, where there is only fine sand that they are constantly removing in search of more victims. Hundreds of homes, ninety percent adobe, were demolished in zones 2, 3 and 6, but the consequences were greater in the colonies in zone 3, since many shacks fell into the ravine.
heroic case
Telma Pérez Alvarado, 14 years old, died under a house on 24th Avenue and 8th. street, zone 6. He had already gone out into the street with his relatives, but he remembered a child who had fallen asleep and returned to take him out. She managed to reach him and threw him towards the street, seconds before she was under the house. His heroic act cost him his life.
Thousands injured
At the San Juan de Dios General Hospital there is no exact data, but the staff has worked constantly. They indicated that the number exceeds ten thousand. Because there are numerous people who have been taken by rescue forces, and others by their families, the injured have been treated in the patio and emergency corridors and even so there is a lack of space to accommodate them. Mats are placed in any space left by another less affected injured person, to provide help to the new arrivals.
Rout
Patients who were in the hospital on February 4 left the hospital at 8 in the morning, due to the fear of the earthquake. They indicated that it is more pleasant to die surrounded by your loved ones than to be bedridden and unable to leave the place in moments of greatest danger.
“Guatemala is beaten, but not mortally wounded”
The President of the Republic, General Kjell Laugerud García, recounted on radio and television a bleak panorama of what he was able to personally observe during the long tour he made throughout the country. “We have been punished, but not defeated. The earthquake affected the 326 municipalities that make up the entire Republic. All of Guatemala is hit, but not mortally wounded.”
“We will take Guatemala forward, not only because we have the obligation to do so but because we have the will and the desire… As president and as a Guatemalan, I will be at the forefront in every day, in every effort that must be made to bring aid even to the most distant places. We need the cooperation, the help, the good faith and good will of everyone. I ask not to lose faith and calm, nor to be carried away by malicious nonsense.”
*Texts of 3 notes from edition 7479, extra from February 5.
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This note is part of the commemorative series of our diamond wedding, it is a journey through news that marked the history of Guatemala, with original texts and images from each era, as a reliable testimony of our mission of service.