Mexico City, 03 January (H.S.): A powerful 6.5-magnitude earthquake struck southern Mexico shortly before 8:00 a.m. local time on Friday, claiming two lives near the epicentre in Guerrero state, damaging around 50 homes in San Marcos, and sending millions fleeing into streets from Mexico City 400 kilometres (250 miles) north amid piercing seismic sirens.

The US Geological Survey pinpointed the hypocentre 35 kilometres (22 miles) deep, 14 kilometres southwest of San Marcos—a rural township in the Sierra Madre del Sur—and roughly 92 kilometres (57 miles) northeast of battered resort hub Acapulco, triggering over 850 aftershocks including a 4.8-magnitude event.

Guerrero Governor Evelyn Salgado Pineda confirmed a woman in her fifties perished when her home collapsed atop her in San Marcos, where Mayor Misael Lorenzo Castillo tallied 50 houses destroyed or cracked, prompting urgent structural audits and evacuations; civil defence tallied landslides on Tixtla-Chilpancingo highway, utility snaps, and outages.

In Mexico City's Benito Juárez borough, a 67-year-old man succumbed after tumbling during second-floor evacuation, with 12 injured citywide—including falls and panic-induced mishaps—while lamppost speakers blared alerts amid swaying skyscrapers on reclaimed Lake Texcoco's unstable fill.

President Claudia Sheinbaum interrupted her National Palace mañanera briefing—resuming post-evacuation after conferring with Salgado—to report no widespread devastation, crediting robust early-warning apps and infrastructure hardened since 1985's apocalyptic 8.1-magnitude toll of 13,000.

Acapulco tourists bolted shirtless from hotels as tremors rippled the bay—CCTV capturing swaying facades—while Chilpancingo hospital evacuated amid major cracks, and IMSS Bienestar facilities in San Marcos and Acapulco sustained ceiling collapses; Mexico City International Airport logged minor disruptions, with two buildings eyed for collapse risk.

Resident Rogelio Moreno decried San Marcos as devastated, and Acapulco physician José Raymundo Díaz Taboada recounted rumbling prelude, barking dogs, and severed communications to Costa Chica kin, his preparedness backpack at hand for quakes eclipsing September's 7.1 (369 dead) and 1985 cataclysm.

Straddling five plates in the Ring of Fire, Mexico's vulnerability persists despite post-2017 advancements like SASMEX sensors affording 30-60 seconds' flight time warnings.

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Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar