At Least 36 Die in Venezuela Quake

A powerful earthquake rattled northeastern Venezuela on Wednesday, killing at least 36 people, including students who were trapped inside a collapsed school building, and injuring 157 others.

The country’s worst earthquake in 30 years--with an initial magnitude of 5.5--sent thousands of people fleeing from homes, restaurants and office buildings.

Seven hours after the midafternoon quake, about 30 people remained trapped in a demolished multistory insurance company building in downtown Cumana, about 200 miles east of Caracas, government spokesman Fernando Egana said.

“We felt the tremor . . . and I started to run for the door. Then the walls and roof started to fall, and the entire building collapsed,” Rosmira Bastida, 14, who had been at her dentist’s office in the building, said in a phone interview.

Rescue workers finally reached Rosmira after she had spent 2 1/2 hours trapped beneath rubble, praying and shouting for help. Her 17-year-old sister, Lisbet, who was in the dentist’s waiting room, was killed by debris, Rosmira said.

A school in the town of Cariaco, about 45 miles east of Cumana, was reduced to rubble by the quake, killing at least 22 people, said Francisco Daboin, director of civil defense in Caracas, the capital.

The quake was centered about 30 miles north of Cumana. It was felt all the way from Caracas, located in the north-central part of the country, east to the Caribbean island nation of Trinidad and Tobago.