Deadly 7.8 Quake Hits Mexico

A powerful earthquake of magnitude 7.8 ripped across Mexico on Tuesday night, killing at least 21 people, shaking buildings, rattling nerves across several western states and sending terrified residents into the streets of the nation’s capital.

The heaviest damage was believed to have occurred in the states of Colima, Puebla, Tlaxcala and Jalisco, but detailed reports were hindered because phone lines were overloaded with calls.

According to the U.S. Geological Survey in Golden, Colo., the 45-second quake was centered 30 miles south-southeast of the seaside resort city of Manzanillo in the state of Colima, 310 miles west of Mexico City.

The 8:07 p.m. quake was followed by an aftershock of between magnitude 3 and 4.

Nine people were killed in the state capital, Colima, and 10 elsewhere in the same state, Gov. Fernando Moreno Pena said. Radio reports said most of the victims died when buildings collapsed.

Two deaths were reported in the state of Jalisco.

Manzanillo was struck by a magnitude 7.9 temblor Oct. 9, 1995, that triggered mudslides, toppled power lines and killed dozens of people. The fault system involved in that quake also was responsible for the magnitude 8.2 temblor that killed 10,000 people in Mexico City on Sept. 19, 1985.

“This quake is large enough to be capable of substantial damages and casualties,” said Don Blakeman, a geophysicist with the USGS.

Mexico’s State Department reported that some government buildings in the worst-hit areas had suffered considerable damage. Pedro Macias, a civil protection official in the Jalisco state capital of Guadalajara, said some buildings in the metropolitan area had sustained considerable cracking.

In Mexico City, the quake swayed office buildings and froze traffic, as workers and residents poured into the streets clutching pets, blankets and each other.

Tuesday’s temblor unleashed instant memories of the devastating 1985 quake, and although no injuries were reported in the capital, there were numerous psychological casualties.

“It was horrible, frightening,” said Carla Medina, who works on the 13th floor of a mid-rise office tower in the city’s historic center. “The building started to shake back and forth. Then the alarm sounded and the electricity went off. The shaking was tremendous.”

Throughout the capital, anxious residents milled about on sidewalks, some smoking, others laughing nervously, still others staring up at the taller buildings for signs of damage.

Police cars equipped with loudspeakers roamed the streets, asking if people were all right.

Luis Wintergerst Toledo, director of civil protection in Mexico City, said that no buildings had fallen within the capital’s limits. But he said there had been reports of fires breaking out, fed by leaking gas. Some hospitals were temporarily without electricity, he said, but electric company officials were working to restore power.

“We have a culture of civil protection because of the 1985 earthquake,” Toledo said. Civil protection officials in Guadalajara have dispatched emergency crews to the town of Villa de Alvarez in the state of Colima, where the Red Cross had reported casualties.

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Times staff writer Jessica Garrison in Los Angeles contributed to this report.