Earthquake in Caracas Venezuela Over 164 Dead Rescuers Looking for More Survivors

Emergency services searching the rubble of a collapsed building on Wednesday.Credit...Adriana Loureiro Fernandez for The New York Times

The 7.2- and 7.5-magnitude earthquakes left at least 164 dead and hundreds missing, the authorities said. The full scale of the damage was still becoming clear.

Here’s the latest.

Rescue crews intensified their search for survivors on Thursday as Venezuelans began to grapple with the scale of the devastation caused by the worst earthquakes to hit the country in nearly six decades.

The Venezuelan government said that at least 164 people had been killed and nearly 1,000 injured in the twin quakes on Wednesday, which struck the country’s populous northern states. The toll was virtually certain to rise as rescuers began to reach the worst-affected areas.

Videos posted on social media show collapsed residential towers in the capital, Caracas, and in the nearby port city of La Guaira, where more than 100 buildings were destroyed, according to the United Nations’ main humanitarian agency. There were growing fears about the toll in nearby shantytowns, where many people live in precarious homes built on hillsides.

Venezuela is rich in oil and other resources, but is still trying to emerge from a decade-long depression that wiped out most of its economic production and led millions to flee the country. Its rescue services have been hollowed out, infrastructure has been left to rot and inflation has reached record highs, compounding the challenges of the recovery.

The disaster comes at a decisive moment in Venezuela’s modern history, less than six months after the U.S. military raid that removed the long-ruling autocrat, Nicolás Maduro. His arrest by U.S. forces in January has transformed the country from a U.S. adversary into an effective satellite state.

The earthquakes are expected to be the worst humanitarian disaster in Venezuela in decades. The hard-hit port of La Guaira is still scarred by devastating landslides in 1999 that are estimated to have killed at least 15,000.

The earthquakes are likely to scramble the complex tussle for power and fortune that has followed Mr. Maduro’s downfall. His former vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, took over as president with Washington’s blessing but has faced growing popular discontent — and is resisting calls for new elections.

In the hours after the quakes, Ms. Rodríguez called for national unity and pointed to the promises of international aid received by her government, including from President Trump. Her handling of the disaster, however, will be scrutinized by Venezuelan voters hungry for political change, as well as the emboldened opposition.

Venezuela, in recent months, has become an arena for investors scrambling to profit from Ms. Rodríguez’s campaign to open up the oil and mining industries to Western capital and restructure its pile of public debt, one of the world’s largest. Many foreign companies had cited the poor state of the country’s infrastructure as an investment obstacle, a problem that will be exacerbated by the earthquakes.

Here’s what else to know:

• Witnesses: Residents of Caracas and nearby cities described scenes of terror and confusion as buildings collapsed, windows rattled, and homes lost power when two major earthquakes struck the country on Wednesday evening.

• Structural risks: The U.S. Geological Survey said that many people in affected areas live in structures made of brick masonry and adobe block construction that are not reinforced and therefore more vulnerable to earthquakes.

• International aid: Ms. Rodríguez said that rescuers from other countries would start arriving in Venezuela early Thursday, including teams from the United States, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Mexico and Qatar. China, Brazil and several Caribbean nations have also offered support, she added.

• Regional impact: The government of Curaçao said that people on the Caribbean island nation, 40 miles off the Venezuelan coast, had also felt tremors. There were no immediate reports of serious damage there.

• Past disasters: The earthquakes were expected to be the worst humanitarian disaster in Venezuela in decades. Devastating landslides are estimated to have killed at least 15,000 in 1999 and the quakes drew comparisons to a 1967 earthquake that hit Caracas and left more than 200 people dead.

Amy Graff, Isayen Herrera, Tibisay Romero and Francesca Regalado contributed reporting.

June 25, 2026, 9:02 a.m. ET18 minutes ago

Leo Sands

Breaking news reporter

The U.N.'s main humanitarian agency is directing incoming search and rescue personnel to arrive in Venezuela at Caracas’s “cleared” La Carlota air base, after earthquake damage forced the closure of the nearby Simón Bolívar International Airport. The agency said international teams should prioritize reaching La Guaira and Caracas, two of the hardest hit cities.

June 25, 2026, 8:48 a.m. ET32 minutes ago

Ravi Mattu

President Delcy Rodríquez said in a phone call to state television that Venezuela was coordinating with the Inernational Monetary Fund on a $200 million fund to help with reconstruction.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Thursday that he had spoken to President Delcy Rodríguez of Venezuela and that the United States was “deploying search and rescue teams from Fairfax County, Virginia, and Los Angeles.” Speaking to reporters while traveling in Bahrain, Rubio said other teams would follow, and that the United States was also providing Venezuela with aerial imagery.

He added that the Defense Department would be running aid flights given that the airport in Caracas, the capital, was badly damaged.

June 25, 2026, 8:41 a.m. ET40 minutes ago

Leo Sands

Breaking news reporter

Details about the scale of the devastation across Venezuela are still emerging. The U.N.’s main humanitarian agency reports that at least 100 buildings have collapsed in La Guaira, a port city near the capital, overwhelming the local authorities there.

June 25, 2026, 8:24 a.m. ET57 minutes ago

Ravi Mattu

Chevron said in a statement that its employees in Venezuela were accounted for and its business was operating there after the earthquakes. The company remained in Venezuela when others had pulled back during years of political and economic upheaval in the country. It is now looking to expand operations and increase investment after the United States deposed Nicolás Maduro, the former leader.

June 25, 2026, 8:12 a.m. ET1 hour ago

John Yoon

Breaking news reporter

The disaster is the latest major challenge for President Delcy Rodríguez.

Image

President Delcy Rodríguez became leader after the U.S. military deposed and captured her predecessor, Nicolás Maduro. Credit...Federico Parra/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

President Delcy Rodríguez of Venezuela has only been in office for a few months, after Nicolás Maduro, the former leader whom she served under, was deposed and captured by the U.S. military. The deadly earthquakes that struck the country on Wednesday now force her to deal with a major disaster on top of her serious political challenges.

After U.S. forces spirited Mr. Maduro out of the country in January to face drug trafficking charges in New York, Ms. Rodríguez found herself in a complex balancing act: She has had to juggle the demands of President Trump, having assumed power with Washington’s blessing, while trying to assert authority over Maduro loyalists and manage Venezuelans’ expectations of an economic bonanza.

The two major earthquakes that struck Venezuela late on Wednesday hammered the country’s fragile infrastructure, raising the prospects of a high death toll and threatening to further set back the country’s recovery after years of mismanagement and corruption.

Venezuela’s acting president, Delcy Rodríguez, said in a televised address that the quakes had caused widespread disruption to public infrastructure, especially in the capital, Caracas, and the neighboring state of La Guaira, which she said was the hardest hit. She said that there had been power outages in Caracas and La Guaira, though the electricity grid continued to function in the rest of the country. 

Early Thursday, no lights were on in parts of Caracas, especially in the west of the city, and streets were flooded from burst water pipes.

“Dozens of buildings have collapsed, and right now we are in very arduous rescue operations,” Ms. Rodríguez said, adding later: “This is a true tragedy.”

Venezuela’s electrical grid has suffered chronic outages, including in 2019, when a national blackout was attributed to a failure at a hydropower plant caused by mismanagement and corruption. Over the past 10 years, water supplies have run dangerously low. Hospitals have also been failing and lack basic resources.

The U.S. Geological Survey said that many people in the quake-affected region live in vulnerable structures constructed from bricks and adobe. Similar weaknesses existed in 1967, when an earthquake in Caracas killed hundreds of people and officials attributed the deaths to faulty construction.

Officials shut off domestic gas supplies in the affected areas and water service was disrupted in parts of Caracas and several northern states, including Miranda, Falcón, Yaracuy, Zulia and La Guaira, she said.

Subway and rail services were also suspended for rescue and recovery efforts, Ms. Rodríguez said. Simón Bolívar International Airport, which serves the capital, was closed after it suffered heavy damage. Schools will be closed for the rest of the week, she added.

Internet connectivity in Venezuela late Wednesday after the quakes dropped to around 65 percent from over 90 percent, according to data from NetBlocks, an internet monitoring group. The country’s restrictions on the social network X appeared to remain in place, said Isik Mater, director of research at NetBlocks. Such internet restrictions, which are widespread in Venezuela and aimed at political control, have added to the communication limitations.

The pre-existing weaknesses in Venezuela’s health system have made rescue efforts more challenging, said Dan Hovey, vice president of emergency response at Direct Relief, a California-based humanitarian organization providing aid to Venezuela. The road closures, power outages and communication disruptions have also created logistical hurdles for delivering aid, he said.

“We have been in contact with some partners this evening and are continuing to reach others as they assess conditions,” he said.

June 25, 2026, 7:14 a.m. ET2 hours ago

Axel Boada

Footage shared on social media shows a crowd of people in the city of Naguanagua, about 110 miles west of Caracas, calling out to a man who approached a partially collapsed building to move a motor bike. Seconds after he moved the bike, another part of the structure came down, and debris fell near where the man was standing. 

June 25, 2026, 7:01 a.m. ET2 hours ago

Leo Sands

Breaking news reporter

Here’s what to know about the earthquakes.

Image

Emergency workers attempting to rescue people trapped in the rubble of a residential building in Caracas, Venezuela, on Wednesday.Credit...Adriana Loureiro Fernandez for The New York Times

Deadly twin earthquakes struck Venezuela in succession on Wednesday evening, leveling buildings and transforming areas of its populous northern states into scenes of destruction.

The extent of casualties and damage was beginning to become clearer on Thursday morning as rescuers combed through rubble. At least 164 people were killed and hundreds more were injured, officials said. Many others have been reported missing.

President Delcy Rodríguez said that initial reports of deaths did not include the worst-hit state of La Guaira.

Here’s what to know.

Shake intensity

Weak

Severe

Population density

INITIAL QUAKE

200 mi

LARGER AFTERSHOCK

200 mi

Note: Map shows the area with a shake intensity of 3 or greater, which U.S.G.S. defines as “weak,” though the earthquake may be felt outside the areas shown.Sources: U.S.G.S. (epicenter, shake intensity); LandScan via Oak Ridge National Laboratory (population density). All times on the map are Venezuela time.William B. Davis and John Keefe/The New York Times

How big were the quakes?

Seismologists recorded the earthquakes’ epicenters in the Venezuelan state of Yaracuy, west of Caracas. Tremors were felt more than 100 miles away.

The initial one hit at 6:04 p.m. Eastern time on Wednesday with a magnitude of 7.2. The epicenter was near San Felipe, a city of about 220,000 people.

Around 39 seconds later, a second, stronger quake with a magnitude of 7.5 hit nearby. It was the most forceful earthquake to strike Venezuela since 1900.

According to the United States Geological Survey, the earthquakes struck at a relatively shallow depth, making them particularly dangerous. They were the result of the Caribbean tectonic plate grinding against the South American one.

Two smaller follow-up earthquakes were recorded near Caracas, and seismologists assessed that at least one aftershock at a magnitude of 5.0 or greater over the next week is likely.

How many people have died?

Ms. Rodríguez said in a phone call to state television on Thursday morning that at least 164 people had been killed. Hundreds more were reported injured.

The strongest tremors struck the northern states of Yaracuy, Carabobo, Aragua and La Guaira, which include some of Venezuela’s most populous regions.

According to the U.S. Geological Survey, many houses in those areas are made of unreinforced brick masonry and adobe blocks, leaving them particularly vulnerable. 

In some neighborhoods of Caracas, buildings collapsed and the power went out. Witnesses described buildings shaking violently, windows rattling and water pipes bursting.

Photos and videos verified by The New York Times show concrete buildings reduced to rubble and others severely damaged. In the port city of La Guaira, a scruffy gateway to the capital, buildings as tall as 10 stories high collapsed and high-rise tower blocks were seen tilting. 

Simón Bolívar International Airport, which is in the same state and serves Caracas, was closed by authorities after it suffered heavy damage. Video shows collapsed ceilings in one of the terminal buildings.

How are emergency crews responding?

Venezuelan authorities have mobilized hundreds of emergency responders to look for survivors. Ms. Rodríguez declared a state of emergency, called on doctors and nurses to report to work to care for the injured and said that hotels and shelters would be opened for those left without homes.

At the site of one collapsed building in El Paraíso, a neighborhood of Caracas, rescuers pulled a young girl and a dog from the rubble. In the capital’s Chacao municipality, the mayor said that at least 22 people had been rescued.

Venezuela’s fragile infrastructure — including rail, electricity and health care systems that have suffered from years of corruption and mismanagement — were also hammered by the quakes, further hampering response efforts.

The United States and several Latin American countries said they would send humanitarian aid and rescue personnel. Ms. Rodríguez said that some of those teams, as well as others from the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Mexico and Qatar, would begin arriving on Thursday.

The earthquakes caused over 100 buildings to collapse in the city of La Guaira, the U.N.’s main humanitarian agency said, overwhelming local authorities. 

What is the political situation in Venezuela? 

Venezuela is reeling from years of economic turmoil and crippling U.S. sanctions, and the earthquakes pose an immediate challenge for the president, Ms. Rodríguez.

In an audacious raid in January, U.S. forces captured and deposed the autocratic president, Nicolás Maduro, transporting him to the United States to face federal drug charges. President Trump handpicked Ms. Rodríguez as his successor and promised that the change would “unleash prosperity” by reviving Venezuela’s oil industry.

Six months on, there has been little sign of dramatic economic turnaround under Ms. Rodríguez, whose approval rating fell to 25 percent in May. Public coffers remain largely empty, leaving the government ill equipped to fund basic services. 

Although the Trump administration has issued special exemptions from sanctions for companies interested in doing business in Venezuela, none has publicly committed to bringing significant capital into the country. Annual inflation is falling but remains the world’s highest, the currency has continued to decline in value, and though wages have increased, they are still too low to to lift many out of destitution.