{"id":2424,"date":"2026-10-10T10:03:49","date_gmt":"2026-10-10T05:03:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=2424"},"modified":"2026-10-10T10:03:49","modified_gmt":"2026-10-10T05:03:49","slug":"strong-quake-shakes-panama-but-avoids-major-destruction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=2424","title":{"rendered":"Strong quake shakes Panama, but avoids major destruction"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

A magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck southern Panama on Friday, damaging buildings and sending \u200bthousands into the streets, but the country appeared to escape widespread destruction or deaths.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The US Geological Survey said the earthquake hit at \u200ca depth of 12.6 km, with an epicentre in a sparsely populated area about 200km from the capital, and that some casualties were possible.<\/p>\n

In the following hours, even as more than 40 aftershocks rattled the isthmus nation, the Panama Canal and Cobre Panama copper mine reported normal operations, and the Tocumen International Airport lifted a suspension on flights.<\/p>\n

Office \u200bworkers in the upscale business hub of downtown Panama City fretted about how to get home in the snarl of traffic, after the quake \u200bsent thousands into the streets.<\/p>\n

Juan Sanchez, a 37-year-old economy ministry employee, waited for a bus he said he doubted \u2060would arrive.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey evacuated all of these buildings. Everyone is outside. Now the problem is, how do we get home?\u201d<\/p>\n

President Raul Mulino travelled to Penonome, a \u200bcity about halfway between the epicentre and Panama City, where some buildings collapsed, and a church was damaged.<\/p>\n

Despite the force of Friday\u2019s tremor, the country appeared \u200bto have been spared the destruction<\/a> of other recent powerful quakes in the region<\/a>, with no deaths or injuries immediately reported.<\/p>\n

Back-to-back quakes in Venezuela in June killed several thousand people, while a quake in Colombia in August killed more than 300.<\/p>\n

An exposure report by the USGS estimated about 43,000 Panamanians lived in areas with at least severe exposure to the quake.<\/p>\n

This \u200bcompares to nearly 1.4 million in the area of the twin quakes in Venezuela and over 1.6 million in the quake-hit zone of western Colombia.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Prolonged vibrations<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Nestor \u200bLuque, director of Panama\u2019s geosciences institute, attributed the quake to the Azuero Sona Fault System that he said contained a massive buildup of pressure that is occasionally released.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe seismic signals have travelled throughout \u200cthe national \u2060territory, and that is why it could be felt everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Panama City, Luque said he counted 40 seconds of vibrations, though other areas may have felt even longer tremors.<\/p>\n

Sabina Rios, who was on the sixth floor of an old US military-era building in Panama City, said the shaking was unusually strong and prolonged.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe quake felt strong and lasted a long time, the longest I\u2019ve felt in years,\u201d Rios said.<\/p>\n

Victor Pinzon, a 48-year-old maintenance worker, told Reuters he had \u200bwatched high-rise window cleaners ride out the \u200bshaking.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a miracle they didn\u2019t \u2060get killed,\u201d he said. \u201cThey looked like they were swinging in a hammock.\u201d<\/p>\n

Strong earthquakes are not common in Panama, and some elderly residents were in tears as they evacuated into the streets.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re scared. It\u2019s just the two of us old folks \u200bhere. The house has cracked, and we\u2019re afraid it could fall on us,\u201d said Ricardo Brown, 74, in Herrera \u200bprovince in southern \u2060Panama, where he said he saw a number of damaged homes.<\/p>\n

Omar Smith, who heads Panama\u2019s civil protection agency, told news outlet Telemetro Reporta that impacts had also been reported in Chitre, the capital of Herrera, and along the coast in Los Santos province.<\/p>\n

The USGS estimated economic losses could amount to 1% to 10% of Panama\u2019s gross domestic \u2060product, and \u200belectricity provider Naturgy reported power outages in six provinces.<\/p>\n

Panama was due to hold a national evacuation \u200bdrill on Monday of next week to test the country\u2019s emergency response.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck southern Panama on Friday, damaging buildings and sending \u200bthousands into the streets, but the country appeared to escape widespread destruction or deaths. The US Geological Survey said the earthquake hit at \u200ca depth of 12.6 km, with an epicentre in a sparsely populated area about 200km from the capital, and that some casualties were possible. In the following hours, even as more than 40 aftershocks rattled the isthmus nation, the Panama Canal and Cobre Panama copper mine reported normal operations, and the Tocumen International Airport…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english"],"gutentor_comment":0,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2424"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2424\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}