Where Data Tells the Story
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ELI5 (Explain It Like I'm 5)
Two huge earthquakes recently hit Venezuela just 39 seconds apart, the strongest the country has felt in over 100 years.
The shaking happened near the coast, far from the capital city, Caracas, but a map shows the ground shook hard all the way there too, because the earthquake traveled along a long crack in the earth that runs near the coast.
More than 1,700 people have died. Many buildings weren't strong enough to withstand the shaking, and more shaking could still occur.
The Story
More than 1,700 people have died since last week’s devastating earthquakes in Venezuela.
The 7.5 magnitude earthquake struck northern Venezuela around 6 p.m. on June 24, only 39 seconds after a 7.2 magnitude foreshock.
The capital, Caracas, was badly damaged, and the state of La Guaira has been declared a disaster zone.
To get a mental picture of this catastrophe, the graphic above is a shake intensity map showing earthquake epicenters near San Felipe, Yaracuy state.
The map is based on estimations from the United States Geological Survey (USGS).
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A magnitude 7.2 foreshock struck just after 6 p.m. local time on June 24.
Thirty-nine seconds later, a magnitude 7.5 mainshock followed, which the USGS calls a “doublet,” a rare phenomenon involving two major earthquakes of similar destructive energy in immediate succession.
The stronger of the two is the largest earthquake to strike Venezuela since 1900, when a 7.7 magnitude quake hit the country.
The doublet was possible because of the region’s specific geology.
Northern Venezuela sits within a broad, transpressional boundary zone between the Caribbean Plate and the South American Plate, rather than along a single fault.
That zone is wide and fragmented, capable of rupturing in multiple places within seconds (which is exactly what the map’s dotted plate boundary line, running along the coast, represents).
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