La zona más afectada cubría alrededor de 30.000 km², con una población de 2,5 millones de personas. Cerca de veintitrés mil personas fallecieron y setenta y siete mil resultaron gravemente heridas. 258,000 casas fueron destruidas, dejando a cerca de 1,2 millones de personas sin hogar. 40 % de la infraestructura hospitalaria nacional fue destruida, mientras que otros centros de salud también sufrieron daños sustanciales.[3] Aparecieron grietas en el suelo en muchos lugares del país, y algunas llegaron a medir hasta un metro de ancho;[8] también la cima de algunos cerros se agrietó y luego los cerros se desmoronaron, soterrando pueblos enteros y carreteras.[9].
Treinta y seis horas después del terremoto, los sobrevivientes vivían en albergues temporales improvisados en las calles y no tenían alimentos, ni agua potable ni dinero.[10]
Las réplicas también provocaron víctimas mortales cuando a éstas les cayeron paredes de casas en ruinas sobre los albergues que habían instalado en las aceras junto a las paredes inestables; los sobrevivientes optaron entonces por mover sus albergues al centro de las calles.[11].
El riesgo de una epidemia de fiebre tifoidea se logró evitar porque cuando se suspendió el servicio de agua potable, el gobierno emitió boletines radiales de información sobre como prevenir enfermedades derivadas del consumo de agua sin tratamiento.[12] Tampoco hubo un incremento en problemas psicosomáticos entre los sobrevivientes, a pesar de la experiencia traumática que padecieron.[13] Los problemas que sí se dieron fueron: diarrea, problemas pulmonares y oculares, estos últimos por la cantidad de polvo que se levantó de los escombros y por las réplicas.[14].
El pillaje también se desató, y ante la falta de elementos de seguridad por las labores de ayuda se organizaron patrullas civiles para evitarlo;[15] los miembros de las patrullas eran vecinos voluntarios que estaban armados como podían y no llevaban a los capturados a las autoridades sino que ellos mismos se encargaban de escarmentarlos.[16].
Innumerables derrumbes en los taludes de relleno y en los taludes de corte en las carreteras[17] dejaron numerosas comunidades incomunicadas, especialmente en la carretera al Atlántico —paralela a la línea del Ferrocarril del Norte de Guatemala—, la carretera entre San Lucas Sacatepéquez y Antigua Guatemala y la carretera CA-I entre Patzún y Panajachel.[17].
Affected areas
As the bodies were recovered, the magnitude of the disaster was revealed; The authorities organized the excavation of collective graves, the number of dead was so great that they had no alternative. Many bridges, pylons, light and telephone poles and roads collapsed or were destroyed. The rails of the railway lines twisted like snakes. Several departments of the country were affected by the earthquake: Chimaltenango, Chiquimula, El Progreso "El Progreso (Guatemala)"), Guatemala "Guatemala (department)"), Huehuetenango "Huehuetenango (department)"), Izabal, Sacatepéquez and Sololá "Sololá (department)"), as well as many towns and cities; The port facilities of Puerto Barrios, head of the department of Izabal, were destroyed by the earthquake.
The department of Chimaltenango "Chimaltenango (department)") was the most affected by the earthquake. It recorded almost fourteen thousand deaths and many towns such as San Martín Jilotepeque were completely ruined; In fact, in San Martín Jilotepeque only the colonial fountain in the town's central square survived.[18].
The CA-I Highway—the former Inter-American highway—suffered severe damage between Patzicía, Patzún, Godínez and Panajachel[19]; The repairs to this road were carried out by the Secretariat of Public Works of Mexico, which sent more than two hundred men in self-sufficient detachments - that is, with their own camps, machinery and supplies.
In Santa Apolonia there were more than 600 deaths in the urban and rural area, in Lavega, a village between Santa Apolonia and San José Poaquil, there were landslides of peaks that were on that road, thus burying more than 20 homes, several families went to take refuge in the municipality for a few days while everything calmed down, Doña Olivia is an older lady who witnessed everything with her children and thanks to her we were able to know more exact information about that tragic day
Guatemala City and its surroundings suffered the worst damage, despite being far from the earthquake's epicenter; cities such as Mixco and Villa Nueva "Villa Nueva (Guatemala)") and the periphery of the city was more destroyed than the center because the houses were made of adobe, the National Palace "Palacio Nacional de la Cultura (Guatemala)") and the neighboring Presidential House "Casa Presidencial (Guatemala)") did not suffer major damage.[22] The Catholic temples of the Metropolitan Cathedral, which suffered damage to its towers which had been rebuilt after having been destroyed by the earthquakes of 1917 and 1918, which also caused the elliptical dome that it had at that time to collapse,[23][24] the Recolección Church and the Ermita del Carmen on the hill of the same name suffered considerable damage.[22][a].
Guatemala City was in chaos, thousands of people were buried in the rubble, many dead or seriously injured; shelters were improvised with sheets and blankets and people slept on the floor, while health centers soon ran out of first aid medicines and food.[25] The earthquake cut off drinking water[26] and supplies quickly ran out as both grocery stores and bakeries remained closed, forcing survivors to stand in long lines to obtain food,[27] which was distributed by elements of the army.[28] The victims had to remain in the streets since even the hospitals left their patients outside, since the buildings were in poor condition[29] and the nauseating smell was perceived coming from broken drains or from the surface of the earth and from buried bodies that were beginning to decompose.[30] The hospital for special children was destroyed and temporary shelters were improvised with sheets in the surrounding streets; the parents had to take charge of their children's shelter.[31] For their part, on the tenth street in zone 1—Historic Center of Guatemala City—it was reported that there were cracks and demolished houses,[32] as on the 18th street in the same area, while in the Jocotales neighborhood the houses collapsed almost entirely[33].
In San Juan Sacatepéquez, the municipality partially collapsed.[9].
The Mixco police station was left uninhabitable but continued to operate; In the first hours after the earthquake, police officers found one hundred and fifty dead and two hundred injured. Given the seriousness of the situation and the fact that the structure of the facility had collapsed, the local judge authorized the detainees to be released because they were minor offenses.[34].
The highway to the Atlantic suffered damage mainly between kilometer zero in the National Palace and kilometer 80 - in El Rancho[35]. After two and a half weeks, the Ministry of Communications had already built an access road for the communities that had been cut off.[36]. The road was not opened to commercial traffic at the beginning because it was still very dangerous, but Sanarate, Guastatoya and the intermediate towns with Guatemala City already had an emerging access road.[37].
In Antigua Guatemala, Sacatepéquez,[b] several colonial houses and buildings resisted the earthquake because they had walls more than a meter thick; The Palace of the Captains General "Palacio de los Capitanes Generales (Guatemala)")—which had been rebuilt in the late 1880s—withstood the earthquake with some damage and only the eastern façade wall had to be demolished.
The highway between San Lucas Sacatepéquez and Antigua Guatemala was also seriously damaged and had a communication route emerging within two weeks.[38].
Damage to cultural heritage
The earthquake also caused damage to the national cultural heritage with the total or partial destruction of several colonial churches and several historical buildings as well as pre-Columbian ruins.[4] The ruins of Mixco Viejo, in the department of Chimaltenango, suffered enormous damage and some Mayan stelae of Quiriguá, in the department of Izabal, near Los Amates, fell.[4] Apart from the damage suffered by the colonial temples in the country's capital, there was also damage to churches in other parts. of the country. In Antigua Guatemala there was damage to the Cathedral of San José "Catedral de San José (Antigua Guatemala)"), the palaces of the City Council and the Captains General, the churches of Carmen "Iglesia de Nuestra Señora del Carmen (Antigua Guatemala)"), La Compañía "Colegio Compañía de Jesús (Antigua Guatemala)") (which then housed a market), San Francisco "Iglesia de San Francisco (La Antigua Guatemala)") and San Sebastián "Parroquia de San Sebastián (Antigua Guatemala), as well as houses of architectural value; By the way, the Church of La Merced withstood the telluric attacks without major damage;[39] but, on the other hand, according to the Episcopal Conference there were twenty-eight churches with considerable damage.[4] In the capital, very important libraries and collections were damaged, among them those of the Society of Geography and History of Guatemala and the Newspaper Library of the National Archive located in the building of the National Library of Guatemala.[4].
The earthquake also impacted artisanal work, as the majority of artisans lost raw materials, work instruments, finished products and ovens, destroying valuable and picturesque objects, expressive of indigenous and colonial culture, so artisanal producers temporarily faced the economic impact caused by the disaster.[4].