Puerto Rico Is In A State Of Emergency After Deadly 6.4 Earthquake

Soon after a week of seismic activity in Puerto Rico, the strongest of the tremors hit the island on Tuesday (January 7), leading Governor Wanda Vázquez to declare a state of emergency and activate the National Guard, El Nuevo Dia newspaper reported.


Since the 6.4-magnitude earthquake struck the island’s southern coast near Ponce early Tuesday morning, there have been at least 20 aftershocks and the full island is facing power outages and structural harm to roads and bridges, according to NBC News. At least one individual was killed and eight others were injured, the Associated Press reported. This mess comes the day soon after a 5.8-magnitude earthquake hit the island on Monday, damaging homes on the southern coast, according to Reuters.


“We are willing to support anything,” Paul Dahlen, the Puerto Rico National Guard's public affairs officer mentioned in a statement according to El Nuevo Dia. “We have helicopters and helicopter crews that are willing to fly, to evacuate people if needed. We have cargo vehicles that we have used in [hurricane] Maria, to get people out of their homes if required and reach that end.”


Government officials are urging residents to stay house and have closed offices, schools, and then some hospitals in the southwestern region that has been hit hardest by the quakes. Governor Vázquez tweeted that first responders were already reporting to the affected areas to allocate help.


"Citizen security is a priority, so susceptible areas are being inspected and all required measures will be taken to make sure the safety of all Puerto Ricans,” Vázquez mentioned Tuesday morning in a statement, according to NBC News.


This organic mess comes because the United States territory recovers from the devastating 2017 hurricanes that killed approximately 3,000 people and destroyed the infrastructure of an island already facing bankruptcy. Critics called President Donald Trump's response to the organic mess a sign of his "vendetta against Puerto Rico." He resisted sending enough emergency funding to the island, declined to acknowledge the death toll, and complained that the territory was not appreciative. As of publish time, he hasn't commented on the earthquake.