I am okay!
We are all okay, in fact, and thought the city sustained some substantial damage, no one at the hotel was hurt. Supposedly small tremors-- temblors-- are common in Chile and might happen once or twice a day, but this was a true earthquake-- terremoto-- and it was quite exciting.
Unlike most, I was awake at the time and not out clubbing. In bed, trying to sleep... and then stuff starts shaking. My roommate thought I was attacking her before she woke up fully, and by the time she did I was standing in the doorway, bracing myself as picture frames slapped against the walls and something heavy crashed in the bedroom. She joined me a few seconds later, and we held onto each other's arms and the doorframe as the building bucked and rattled like it had grown legs and was trying to hop away. All the lights were out, and the other two in the room appeared in their own doorway not long after us.
We waited it out.
Afterwards we inspected the room, discovered that the TV had fallen off its stand, all the picture frames were crooked, and there were cracks in the wall plaster outside, with shards of it all over the floors. We didn't know whether to leave the building or stay put, so we elected to stay in the building-- outside glass or brick or something could have fallen on us and the building seemed to have ridden out the worst.
The room has a balcony-- we went to it and watched people congregate in the streets as sirens wailed past the buildings. There were very few lights. Few enough to see the stars-- in downtown Santiago, city of a million midnight clubs.
After a while one of the ISA people appeared at the door and told us that we had to meet in the lobby, outside, to see what would happen. No one seemed to know exactly what to do. I threw together my clothes, grabbed my camera, computer, and first aid kit, and jogged down nine flights of stairs with the rest of my room.
Most of the others were gathered outside on the street below. The street lights were off, and dozens of Chileans were standing around, looking a bit shellshocked. A car on the side of the road had put on its emergency flashers, and that was the only local illumination beyond the hotel's emergency lights (powered by a generator that also generated choking fumes). At least six cars rocketed out of the underground parking garage destined for places unknown.
When people returned from clubbing, they had stories to tell. There wasn' t much damage in our area, but they brought reports of broken glass littering the streets, people fleeing to the doors and screaming, and an old church steeple that had come apart and fallen into the street.
"That can't be right, it couldn't have done that."
"You doubt me? I just saw a church slide to pieces before my very eyes! The whole steeple!"
Later that church appeared on the news, minus a steeple.
We stayed outside for about an hour, playing games with the rubble and offering one another bags of Cheerios or blankets, and then were told to go back inside and sleep. Orientation the next morning canceled. Breakfast at 9:30.
We went back and slept-- but the ground still shook every hour or so. Bed rocking. Lights flickering. Something rattling in the closet.
The epicenter of the earthquake was south, an 8.8 on the Richter scale.
Here it measured about a 7.3. Biggest quake in fifteen years.
We're evacuating to a city about an hour east of Valparaiso-- not going to the coast for fear of tsunami.
Bus coming soon.
And hey, don't worry-- we're all okay, and the ISA people are on top of things. Great first introduction to Chile!
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