Updated June 25, 2026 at 4:43 PM EDT
The death toll continues to rise after two major earthquakes in Venezuela, as search and rescue efforts race to find any survivors under the rubble of the many toppled buildings in the capital of Caracas and other hard-hit cities.
Jorge Rodríguez, president of the National Assembly, put the latest toll Thursday at 188 dead, 1,520 injured and 157 reported missing. He added: "So far we've counted more than 200 people still trapped in the debris of buildings, and we are in a tireless race against time to rescue the majority of them alive."
An initial earthquake at about 6 p.m. on Wednesday, a 7.2-magnitude foreshock, was followed less than a minute later by a 7.5-magnitude earthquake around the same area, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
Acting Venezuelan President Delcy Rodríguez has declared a state of emergency, saying several Venezuelan states sustained heavy damage, with La Guairá, north of Caracas, hit the hardest.
"We can say that the state of La Guairá is experiencing a genuine tragedy and has become a disaster zone," she said. A United Nations humanitarian agency reported more than 100 buildings collapsed in La Guairá.
Delcy Rodríguez called for national unity to save lives. "Together we will overcome this tragedy," she said in a televised address.
"People were screaming" because it was so powerful
Photos and video posted online showed leveled buildings, people running for safety and falling debris from structural damage at Simón Bolívar International Airport in Caracas. The airport has since closed.
"When the earthquake started, I was in my house, and it was super hard," Venezuelan journalist María Graterol told NPR's All Things Considered, speaking from Caracas. "You could see how the walls were moving and everything was moving around."
"People were screaming" because of how powerful the back-to-back quakes were, she said.
When she left her apartment, she found residents gathered in a public square. Families with their pet cats waited outside in the street unable to go into their damaged buildings.
Another journalist in Caracas, Julio Blanca, said Thursday the situation in the capital "is devastating."
"There is a sense of sadness and deep silence in the air. The capital, which is usually quite noisy, today is a scene of desolation and introspection," he said.
He pointed to the sadness in one area of the city, Chacao, where a structure known as the Petunia building collapsed, killing at least 11 people.
"The atmosphere is very heavy because you see part of the debris removal — there are a lot of people following this operation," he said. "Seeing such a large structure suddenly reduced to pieces, seeing the clothes of the people who lived there, the different items that were part of their daily lives — undoubtedly affects you a lot, it affects you deeply."
A strong rare "doublet"
The epicenters, which USGS estimated to be about 3 miles apart, were near the town of Morón on Venezuela's Caribbean coast, some 100 miles west of Caracas.
The strongest of the "doublet," as the USGS described the twin quakes, is the largest earthquake to strike Venezuela since 1900, when a 7.7-magnitude quake hit the country, according to USGS.
The total number of deaths and injuries is not yet clear. USGS modeling estimated deaths could be in the thousands to tens of thousands, with economic losses reaching billions to tens of billions of dollars, according to USGS seismologist Paul Earle.
"This doesn't happen very often," Earle told NPR. "When they're right together it's hard to understand what would happen."
At least 138 aftershocks have followed the earthquakes Wednesday, according to the National Assembly president, and seismologists expect they will continue in the coming days.
By USGS' estimate, there's a 40% chance that in the next week a 6-magnitude or larger earthquake would strike in the same region, Earle said, and an "almost certainty" of an earthquake measuring at least a magnitude 5.
International response
Countries around the world have been offering condolences and support in the recovery.
President Trump said online he had instructed his administration to help Venezuela, saying the earthquakes were "both massive in scale and have left a devastating number of deaths."
Rodríguez said U.S. officials have been in constant contact with her administration since the earthquakes. The disaster is a new test for Washington's role in Venezuela, coming more than five months after Trump sent forces to seize Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro from Caracas and said the U.S. would "run" the South American oil-producing country.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the administration is sending search and rescue teams from Fairfax County, Va., and Los Angeles. He said the U.S. is also providing overhead imagery of coastal areas where he said the Venezuelan government does not have full visibility.
"Those are the acute short-term needs over the next 48-72 hours because in search and rescue, you are trying to get to people while you can still save their lives. They are buried under rubble," Rubio said.
The U.S. military's Southern Command said it's supporting government relief operations with logistics and lifesaving capabilities.
The U.N.'s top humanitarian official, Tom Fletcher, said his office is coordinating the deployment of teams from around the world.
"Even before these earthquakes, nearly 8 million people in Venezuela were in need of humanitarian support," Fletcher said in a statement Thursday. "This disaster risks deepening existing vulnerabilities."
Venezuela's interim president announced an initial $200 million reconstruction fund, using resources from the International Monetary Fund, for hospitals and homes damaged by the earthquakes.
The head of the National Assembly also said private and public banks would extend special credit lines for people who lost their main source of income because of the natural disaster.
This is a developing story that may be updated.
Michele Kelemen, Alex Leff and Scott Detrow contributed to this story from Washington.
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