The death toll in Mexico's magnitude 7.1 quake continues to rise. At 6pm Eastern, it rose to 119, that's the largest number of fatalities in a Mexican earthquake since the 1985 quake that killed thousands. (Sept. 19) AP


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MEXICO CITY — At least 149 people were dead after a magnitude-7.1 earthquake struck on Tuesday, crumbling dozens of buildings across a wide area 32 years to the day after a major quake devastated the capital city in 1985.
The earthquake was the second to strike in 12 days. An earlier temblor rocked southern Mexico and shook the capital.
On Tuesday, residents spilled out of buildings — many stayed in the streets until authorities inspected their buildings. Sirens blared throughout the afternoon. Federal Police were spotted bringing in sniffer dogs to find victims.
Many of those in the streets said the force of the quake was as strong as the 1985 earthquake, which claimed thousands of lives, left many more homeless and reduced parts of the city to rubble. 
Rescuers work on the rubble from a building knocked
Rescuers work on the rubble from a building knocked down by a powerful quake in Mexico City on Sept. 19, 2017. A powerful earthquake shook Mexico City on Tuesday, causing panic among the megalopolis' 20 million inhabitants on the 32nd anniversary of a devastating 1985 quake. The US Geological Survey put the quake's magnitude at 7.1 while Mexico's Seismological Institute said it measured 6.8 on its scale. The institute said the quake's epicenter was seven kilometers west of Chiautla de Tapia, in the neighboring state of Puebla.   Omar Torres, AFP/Getty Images
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“This was the same as 1985. It shook bad,” said Gustavo de la Cruz, a parking lot attendant. He spotted a light fixture falling from a pole, but said the damage appeared a less severe as the last time. “That 1985 earthquake wrecked Mexico City,” he said.Others saw the damage first-hand. “There was this explosion,” said Ubaldo Juárez, a barber, who was riding his bike through the trendy, but hard-hit Condesa neighborhood. “I saw this cloud of dust, like something out of a movie.”
The Sept. 7 earthquake triggered an alarm system in Mexico City — quakes often occur far from the capital, which offers a window of 45 seconds to one minute to evacuate buildings. That didn’t occur this this time.
“Normally you have a warning. But this just struck,” said Juárez, who got down on his hands and knees to brace himself. 
The earthquake came ironically on the same day as the 1985 earthquake. It’s a day when Mexican civil protection officials conduct earthquake drills — and office workers, students and apartment dwellers practice abandoning their buildings. 
An earthquake drill occurred barely two hours before the Tuesday earthquake hit.
The 1985 quake killed an estimated 9,500 people and destroyed about 100,000 homes. That quake, a stronger magnitude-8.1, was only one of several over the past few decades to hit Mexico, one of the most seismically active regions in the world.
Mayor Miguel Angel Mancera on Tuesday said buildings fell at 44 places in the capital alone.



President Enrique Peña Nieto tweeted that he was on a flight to Oaxaca when the quake struck, but he returned immediately to Mexico City, where the international airport suspended operations as personnel checked structures for damage.
Throughout the city, rescue workers and residents dug through the rubble of collapsed buildings seeking survivors, AP reported. At one site in the city's Roma neighborhood, rescue workers cheered as they brought a woman alive from what remained of a toppled building. After cheering, the workers immediately called for quiet again so they could listen for the sound of survivors under the rubble.
President Trump, whose promise to build a border wall separating the USA and Mexico has antagonized Mexicans, on Tuesday tweeted: "God bless the people of Mexico City. We are with you and will be there for you."
In a statement, State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert offered condolences "to any who were injured or lost loved ones" on Tuesday. "Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of Mexico affected by today’s 7.1-magnitude earthquake and other recent natural disasters. We stand ready to provide assistance should our neighbors request our help."
Nauert said the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City stands ready to provide consular assistance to any U.S. citizens affected by the earthquake.
Luis Felipe Puente, head of the national Civil Defense agency in Mexico, said on Twitter late Tuesday night that the confirmed death toll had been raised to 149.
Parents and bystanders desperately tried to rescue students trapped in a collapsed school in southern Mexico City. Peña Nieto, who visited the Enrique Rebsamen school, said that 22 people died from the collapse. It’s not clear whether the deaths are already included in the overall toll of at least 149 across the country, The Associated Press reported. 
According to Animal Politico, at least 30 children, including eight adults, are still missing. 
In Cuernavaca, just south of Mexico City, Reuters reported that residents were pinned beneath collapsed buildings.
In Puebla, southeast of the capital, Gov. Tony Gali tweeted that an unspecified number of buildings were damaged, saying, "We deeply regret the loss of life following the #earthquake. My government is acting and providing all the necessary support."
The quake's epicenter was near the town of Raboso, about 76 miles southeast of Mexico City, the U.S. Geological Survey said.
The quake came just 12 days after a magnitude-8.2 quake struck several states along Mexico's Pacific Coast, leaving at least 90 dead.
On Mexico City’s main boulevard, thousands of people streamed out of buildings into the streets in a panic, filling the plaza around the Independence Monument with a mass of people.
Traffic came to a standstill, as masses of workers blocked streets. Clouds of dust rose from fallen pieces of facades.
In one short video posted to Twitter, bystanders watched as a five-story apartment building buckled and crumbled to the street in a shower of dust and debris.
In the city’s Roma neighborhood, which was struck hard by the 1985 quake, small piles of stucco and brick fallen from building facades littered the streets.
Two men calmed a woman, blood trickling from a small wound on her knee, seated on a stool in the street, telling her to breathe deeply.







Araceli Torres, a skin care product distributor, was at Mexico City's Centro Santa Fe shopping center when the earthquake struck. Having lived through the 1985 earthquake, Torres instantly recalled the terrifying feeling she experienced 32 years ago.
"Suddenly everything started shaking," Torres, 54, said. "I think that those who lived through the earthquake back in '85 experienced a psychosis because it started out really hard. ... I felt as if my heart was going to jump out of my chest."
Torres walked toward a roofless parking lot near the mall and said she had never seen so many people there before. People looked nervous — some were crying and some even asked for her phone because no one else had signal. 
"This is very painful because it reminds you of what the experience was like back in '85," she said. "Back then it looked as if we had been in a city that had just been bombarded. You could breath a lot of sadness today."
Though the earthquake of '85 was substantially more destructive and damaging, Torres said she can still see the same kind of solidarity among people: Neighbors or simply people on the street helping others stay calm.
Residents in the Col. Condesa neighborhood and across the city came armed with buckets to help with rescue efforts — many were still wearing their work clothes and arrived straight from the office. 
"The boss sent everyone home. I came to help," said Gonzalo Hernandez, a lawyer still wearing a white dress shirt. "Everyone is asking, 'How can I help out?'"
Volunteers formed long rows to pass buckets full of rubble from a collapsed building. Others brought sandwiches and oranges to feed the volunteers. Urgent calls went out for portable lights to allow rescuers to work and doctors to attend to the injured. Power had been restored in some parts of the city, but the most impacted areas were still in the dark.
The scene was a reminder of the rescue efforts after the 1985 earthquake, when the government response was slow and residents were forced to fend for themselves. Teams formed to dig through rubble — which at the time included hospitals, apartments and hotels. The then president Miguel de la Madrid dithered and even rejected foreign assistance when first offered. 
Gala Dluzhynska was taking a class with 11 other women on the second floor of a building in the Roma neighborhood when the structure collapsed. Dluzhynska said the building’s stairway was very tight and surrounded with glass. As they ran out of the building, everything started falling around them. Some people panicked, she said. Dluzhynska said she fell in the stairway and others began to walk over her.
She shouted for help and someone pulled her to her feet. She said the dust was so thick you couldn’t see anything.
“There weren’t any stairs anymore only rocks,” she said.
She said they were still looking for one classmate who was missing.
Contributing: Amanda Trejos, AP. Follow David Agren on Twitter: @el_reportero. Follow Greg Toppo on Twitter: @gtoppo.