CARACAS — The death toll from a pair of powerful earthquakes that struck Venezuela this week has climbed to at least 920, with more than 3,300 people injured and dozens still believed trapped beneath collapsed buildings, as international rescue teams worked through the weekend in what officials describe as a narrowing window to find survivors.

The disaster, among the deadliest in the country’s modern history, has overwhelmed a healthcare system already strained by years of economic crisis and left thousands of families searching for missing loved ones in a country with some of the most restricted media access in the world.

Twin quakes strike without warning

The earthquakes struck Wednesday evening, just 39 seconds apart. A magnitude 7.2 foreshock hit at 6:04 p.m. local time near San Felipe in Yaracuy state, followed almost immediately by a magnitude 7.5 mainshock centered near the town of Morón on Venezuela’s Caribbean coast, roughly 100 miles west of Caracas. The U.S. Geological Survey identified the stronger quake as the most powerful to strike Venezuela since 1900, when a magnitude 7.7 earthquake hit the country.

USGS seismologist Paul Earle told NPR that earthquakes striking in such close succession is highly unusual. “This doesn’t happen very often,” Earle said. “When they’re right together, it’s hard to understand what would happen.” Earle added that USGS modeling estimated a 40% chance that a magnitude 6 or larger aftershock could strike the same region within a week, along with what he called an “almost certainty” of at least one quake measuring magnitude 5 or higher. At least 138 aftershocks have been recorded since the initial quakes, according to Venezuelan officials, complicating rescue efforts in already unstable structures.

A rising toll and a critical window closing

As of Saturday morning, Jorge Rodríguez, president of Venezuela’s National Assembly, said the death toll stood at 920, with more than 3,300 injured and at least 172 people still believed trapped under rubble. The figure has climbed steadily since the quakes struck, rising from an initial count of 188 dead on Thursday to 589 by Friday morning and then surging past 900 by Saturday as search teams reached previously inaccessible areas.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has stressed the urgency of the search effort. “After an earthquake, the first 72 hours are critical to saving lives,” the agency said Friday, adding that in the search for survivors, “every second matters.” The U.N. agency said it had organized at least 17 international search teams, comprising more than 1,600 personnel and over 100 search dogs, working alongside Venezuelan responders.

La Guaira bears the brunt

The coastal state of La Guaira, just north of Caracas, has suffered the most severe damage of any region in the country. Acting President Delcy Rodríguez described the devastation in stark terms. “We can say that the state of La Guaira is experiencing a genuine tragedy and has become a disaster zone,” she said. A United Nations humanitarian agency reported that more than 100 buildings collapsed in La Guaira alone, with satellite imagery showing dozens of partially or fully flattened structures in the town of Caraballeda.

With nowhere else to go, many displaced residents have taken to sleeping outdoors. In the city of Catia La Mar, families have set up temporary shelters on a baseball field, while others have told reporters they are too afraid to return to damaged buildings that remain standing but structurally compromised.

Overwhelmed hospitals and a struggling response

Venezuela’s healthcare system, already weakened by years of underfunding, has buckled under the surge of injured patients. Rodríguez said 13 hospitals across the country sustained damage in the earthquakes, and at least two hospitals — one in Caracas and one in La Guaira — have collapsed entirely, according to Caracas pediatrician Dr. Huniades Urbina-Medina, who told CNN that surviving facilities are now facing shortages of basic supplies including water, antibiotics, IV solution and anesthetics.

Frustration has grown among residents over what some describe as a slow and under-resourced official response. In some coastal communities, residents have called for civilian volunteers to assist with debris removal using “pickaxes and shovels” rather than wait for heavy machinery that has yet to arrive in critical areas.

An international rescue effort takes shape

Foreign assistance has poured into Venezuela in the days since the quakes struck. Rescue convoys from Mexico, El Salvador and the Dominican Republic arrived by Friday, joining teams already on the ground, including elite search-and-rescue units from Fairfax County, Virginia, and Los Angeles County in the United States. A Miami-Dade Fire Rescue team of 80 personnel and six canine units also deployed to the region. Salvadoran rescuers were among those credited with locating a 15-year-old girl trapped on the ninth floor of a collapsed building in Catia La Mar.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on social media that Washington was “immediately deploying search and rescue teams, medical resources, and humanitarian assistance to Venezuela.” Acting President Rodríguez said she had received a call from President Donald Trump and Rubio, who she said “reaffirmed the United States Government’s support during this difficult time for Venezuela.”

A communications blackout complicates the crisis

The disaster has unfolded against the backdrop of Venezuela’s tightly controlled information environment. According to monitoring group VE sin Filtro, more than 200 websites in the country remain blocked, including news outlets, social media platforms and tools used to circumvent censorship. The United Nations’ Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Venezuela has urged authorities to “fully restore access to social networks and all media outlets,” warning that timely information will be “vital for the protection of the lives, safety, and well-being of the population.”

A crowdsourced website created to track missing persons, Desaparecidos Terremoto Venezuela, has logged more than 62,000 names since the earthquakes struck, with more than 52,000 of those individuals still listed as unaccounted for as of Friday. Those figures have not been independently confirmed by Venezuelan officials.

A nation already in crisis

The earthquakes struck a country already grappling with severe political and economic turmoil, compounding what was already one of the most difficult periods in Venezuela’s recent history. The timing of the disaster — coinciding with a national holiday when many residents were at home with their families rather than at work or school — may have limited casualties in commercial and institutional buildings, even as it left densely populated residential areas particularly vulnerable.

As search efforts continue into the weekend, officials have acknowledged that the death toll is likely to keep rising. With hundreds still missing and rescue teams racing against deteriorating conditions in the rubble, the full scale of the tragedy may not become clear for days or weeks to come.

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