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Rescues Underway After Deadly Earthquakes Hit Venezuela; 16 Killed in Venezuela's Most Powerful Quake in 100 Years; International Airport Damaged in Venezuela Twin Earthquakes; Rubio Offers Condolences, Says U.S. Providing Aid to Venezuela; Record Heat Grips France, Pushing Paris into Red Alert Status. Aired 9-9:45a ET

Aired June 25, 2026 - 09:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[09:00:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ELENI GIOKOS, CNN HOST, CONNECT THE WORLD: Frantic rescues are underway after devastating back-to-back earthquakes in Venezuela. It is 09:00 a.m.

in Caracas, it is 05:00 p.m. here in Abu Dhabi. I'm Eleni Giokos. This is "Connect the World".

Also coming up on the show, Europe is sweltering under a relentless heat dome with France at the epicenter of the extreme heat. We're live in Paris.

Right a new day begins in Venezuela, that's following the country's most powerful earthquake in more than a century -- according to be acting

president.

Well, that number could rise dramatically as the full scale of the devastation emerges.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DELCY RODRIGUEZ, ACTING VENEZUELAN PRESIDENT: At the moment, the figures we have already recorded 164 dead, 971 injured, with 30 aftershocks that have

occurred since the two main consecutive events that we had at 06:00 p.m.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GIOKOS: Well, search teams worked through the night to try find survivors. The U.S., the EU, China, and several other countries are offering to send

help. These images give you an idea of the scale of the destruction in the State of La Guaira, which has been declared a disaster zone.

The north of the country was hit by a major quake, magnitude 7.2 and then just 40 seconds later another with magnitude of 7.5 which is actually twice

as powerful as the first. A woman in the capital, Caracas described how her house was ripped apart.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What I did was throw myself on the floor to call on God. The walls cracked, the kitchen collapsed, the living room is about to

fall. One more movement and it will come down. Here, I'm going to stay here in the street. I have nothing else. At that moment, I only ran out with my

rosary, my phone, which I had on me, and my clothes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GIOKOS: Well Mary Triny Mena is in Caracas with the latest on the rescue efforts.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARY TRINY MENA, JOURNALIST: Daylight in Caracas, and I want to show you one of the places most affected here in the capital of Venezuela, Los Palos

Grandes. Behind me, there was a building at 14 floor building that collapsed completely here. All the authorities have been working tirelessly

throughout the night to trying to find some survivors here in this area, located in the east of Caracas.

They are working along with the service rescues and services providers, and also with neighbors from the community that are helping in this work that

they are taking place today. Just a few minutes ago, the President In- charge of Venezuela, Delcy Rodriguez, updated the number of people that have died during these events, 164 people.

I want to show you this building that is a twin building of the one that collapsed with the similar characteristic. This is still standing alongside

of the one that collapsed here in Los Palos Grandes, Caracas. So far authorities have informed that 164 people died in this area, and the most

affected is La Guaira State, where it was declared national tragedy.

Classes are suspended, but right now, what we are knowing is that the government is looking for resources, especially economic resources, to

battle, overcome this situation. These two massive earthquakes that hit Venezuela on Wednesday. Mary Triny Mena for CNN, Caracas.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GIOKOS: Well, the international airport just north of Caracas is closed due to significant structural damage. Former Venezuelan lawmaker was there when

he -- when the quake actually hit, and he started recording on his phone. Let's take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WILMER AZUAJE, FORMER VENEZUELAN LAWMAKER: It's shaking. It's shaking. Look at what Maiquetia Airport looks like while we're here inside. Look at the

disaster here, completely destroyed. Look at it after the earthquake. Look at how everything ended up.

Everyone, the situation we're experiencing here is serious. A high- magnitude earthquake. Look at how everything ended up. I recorded during the earthquake. I recorded everything.

[09:05:00]

We also helped get people out. Look at the ceiling, everything was destroyed, everything was ruined, look. Maiquetia Airport. The authorities

should be called to safeguard many things. Look at this disaster. This is Maiquetia. We are at the elevators. Look, we're all here. So, we're going

to start broadcasting from this moment.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GIOKOS: Governments across Latin America are sending messages of support and sympathy after the earthquakes. Brazil has expressed solidarity with

the government and people of Venezuela and wished the wounded a speedy recovery. El Salvador's President Bukele said on X, our hearts are with the

people of Venezuela during these difficult times.

And Mexico's Foreign Ministry said it shares all its solidarity with the Venezuelan people and deeply regrets the damage and effects caused.

Venezuela's Acting President Delcy Rodriguez says U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio expressed solidarity and support for Venezuela in a phone call.

Now earlier, Rubio offered condolences from the U.S. government for lives lost in the earthquakes. He says the U.S. is deploying search and rescue

teams, along with medical, as well as humanitarian aid. Rubio spoke while on a tour of Gulf nations as he tries to ease concerns over the U.S.

agreement with Iran to end the war.

We've got Alayna Treene joining us now from the White House. Alayna, good to see you. Devastating images coming through from Venezuela. What more do

we know about the White House response to the earthquakes?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, look over, we did hear from the president himself, Eleni. He posted on social media arguing that

the United States stands ready and willing and able to help. I want to read you some of what he wrote.

He said the two major earthquakes that just hit the great people of Venezuela are both massive in scale and have left a devastating number of

deaths. As I mentioned, he said the USA stands ready, willing, and able to help. I have instructed all agencies of our government to get ready to move

quickly.

We will be there for our new and great friends. Early reports are not good from the president. Now, we did also hear, as you mentioned, Eleni, from

the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, who is currently in the Middle East. He said he has been in touch with Venezuela's Interim President Delcy

Rodriguez, and that the United States has deployed search and rescue teams to help and aid them. I want you to listen to what he told reporters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARCO RUBIO, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: We were already deploying search and rescue teams from Fairfax County, Virginia, and Los Angeles. There'll be

some others we'll add. That's their most immediate need right now is search and rescue efforts. They have a bunch of collapsed buildings, and so

they'll need a lot of help in terms of digging through that.

The airport there is badly damaged, so we'll have to rely on the Department of War to deploy assets there. And then we're also helping them with some

overhead imagery, especially in coastal areas where they don't have full visibility over what the damage has been and what the impact has been.

Those are the acute, like short-term needs over the next 48 to 72 hours, because in search and rescue, you're trying to get to people while you can

still save their lives. They're buried under rubble.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TREENE: -- Eleni, what we also heard from the Secretary of State was that multiple countries have also offered to help. He said that includes Qatar,

El Salvador, and Chile. And one thing I think is worth mentioning here is that these massive and devastating earthquakes in Venezuela are really

going to be a key test of the president's willingness to kind of revert back to, you know, what we've seen traditionally from the U.S. in these

types of crises, which is to offer foreign aid.

He's really moved away from that during his second term in office. Obviously, he got rid of USAID has made other similar moves of that nature,

but Venezuela, of course, is in a very difficult time, not only of course because of this catastrophe, but also after what happened with the United

States going in and capturing their Former President, Maduro.

It really has moved away from its former sponsors and allies like China and Russia, and so it's going to need United States help to get through this,

and this is also something I think you know we've heard from some people arguing that there is some transactional gain to be had here.

Venezuelans are eager to see that the U.S. is going to actually be the allies that the president has promised in his rhetoric. And I think there's

a lot of American companies and people here within the Trump Administration as well, Eleni, that want to show that they are willing to live up to their

word on this.

So, as of now, though, as you've heard from the president, the secretary of state, it does seem like they are ready to send aid and help in all means

necessary.

GIOKOS: Yeah, devastating scenario playing out there in various parts in northern Venezuela. Alayna Treene, thank you so much for that update. I

want to bring you more on the latest. We've got CNN's Allison Chinchar looking at everything on the weather front. Allison, what are you picking

up for us?

[09:10:00]

ALLISON CHINCHAR, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yeah, so I think it's important to note that this -- with this particular earthquake here in Venezuela, this

is what the U.S. Geological Survey is calling a doublet, and essentially what that means is you had not one but two very large earthquakes,

typically around the same size magnitude, but also in very close proximity to each other.

And that is very much the case that we had with these two quakes here, the 7.2 and the 7.5, but there's also talk because Caracas, which is more than

100 miles away, experienced pretty significant damage, and so people kind of want to know, how is it that they had such bad damage, even though they

were relatively far away from the actual epicenter of the main quake.

And a lot of that has to do with the type of earthquake, the type of fault line it was, and the direction in which those waves propagated out from the

epicenter, because in this case they propagated toward the city, taking a lot of that energy with it. It was able to produce much stronger ground

motion in the direction of Caracas.

Also, soil type matters that deep sedimentary deposits that are around those areas kind of amplified the shaking that those regions felt. Now one

of the biggest concerns going forward for this area is certainly going to be the aftershocks. Now, the initial quake, the one that was a 7.2 likely

caused significant damage for these areas in and of itself, that caused a lot of the buildings and homes to become structurally compromised.

Now, you add 40 seconds later, the 7.5 which likely just ended up causing exponential damage to a lot of those surrounding areas, and now we're going

to be adding even more aftershocks to it. Typically speaking, when you have a 7.5 main quake, you will have at least one quake aftershock that is about

a 6.5 magnitude or stronger.

You'll have roughly 10 that are 5.5 magnitude stronger, and about 100 of them that will be 4.5 magnitude or stronger, and a 4.5 may not sound like

it is all that strong. However, once you have had the type of structural significant damage that these areas have seen, even a 4.5 is enough to

cause significant additional damage.

So that's certainly going to be a concern. The others, rain in the forecast, and this is likely going to be a big hindrance to a lot of those

rescue efforts that are ongoing, trying to get people that are trapped in the rubble out safely. They're going to have to contend with some showers

and possibly even some thunderstorms in the area throughout the rest of the day today.

And that is significant, because typically speaking, the vast majority of your aftershocks occur within the first one to seven days after the main

shock happens, so knowing that they're going to be more frequent here in the next few days, and that we also have the rain chances, that is likely

going to cause some significant problems for these areas.

Also, one thing to note, typically speaking, magnitude earthquakes that are about 7 to 7.9 we get roughly about 15 of those per year globally. And we

got two of them within 40 seconds of each other. So again, just to kind of show you the significance of the event that took place in Venezuela.

The other thing to note, too, was how shallow both of these earthquakes were. Now, from seismically speaking, anything that is 70 kilometers deep

or less is actually considered a very shallow earthquake, even though I know 70 kilometers doesn't necessarily sound like that would be something

shallow, but it is when, in terms of earthquakes, both of these were roughly about 10 to 20 kilometers deep, so incredibly, incredibly shallow.

Also, too, Eleni, one thing to note is that this area is incredibly seismically active, a very seismically active region around the world.

GIOKOS: Fascinating. Allison, thank you so much for that context. Really important time to understand exactly what transpired and what could come

next. Much appreciated. Right, we've got Stefano Pozzebon following developments for us from Bogota in Colombia.

Great to have you. What a moment to be looking at these images. What are you understanding about the impact of the earthquake? We're seeing some of

the dramatic images of buildings collapsing and no rescue operations, but also where you are, you felt it in Colombia.

STEFANO POZZEBON, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Yes, Bogota also felt these earthquakes, which occurred around 05:00 p.m. local time, and Bogota sits at more than

1000 kilometers from the epicenter. You can only imagine how badly it was felt in Caracas, which, to confirm, like the morphology of the area

surrounding Caracas, both Caracas and La Guaira, this region just north of the capital that seems to have registered the most impact at this moment.

Both of these are hilly, mountainous areas where the population have built houses and especially high-rise buildings up on the slopes of the

mountains, this could have caused, of course, further damage. If, for example, one building will collapse on top of each other.

We were able to speak with survivors who told us the feeling of standing in their flat, maybe of the fourth, fifth, or sixth floor of their building,

and feeling like literally the earth opening up, the ground opening up beneath their feet, and the floor turning into water.

[09:15:00]

One person described it to me as feeling as she was drowning into the collapsing building. Luckily, she survived, as many others have survived,

but correctly, yes, at least the 164 Venezuelans have been found dead, and that number is probably going to grow and rise in the coming hours, Eleni.

GIOKOS: Yeah, just seeing some of these images, it's absolutely terrifying. Look, we've seen a lot of messages of support, but give me a sense of the

actual support that is offered in terms of assisting with rescue efforts.

POZZEBON: I think we're coming to two shortcomings of bottlenecks, perhaps, the first one is the fact that the main airport in Caracas is currently

unusable, unavailable. It's received significant damage, and so planes cannot fly there. The second one is that even the surrounding airports in

the country are also off the line right now.

This is because, of course, the electronic communication lines have been impacted by the earthquake. The earth control tower in Maiquetia, which is

the main Caracas airport, which also helps coordinating flights with other airports in the area, is offline right now, and this is why most, like many

countries around the region, Colombia, for example, Brazil, but also the United States, have offered help, and aid is coming in.

It's going to trickle down into Venezuela at some point, but right now the first and most important task of the authorities is getting a runway open

and allowing air traffic to come in and out of the country. This is, of course, because Venezuela suffers from chronic shortages of basic goods.

I'm talking about, you know, the most generic medicines, the most generic emergency kits that you might find easily available at the pharmacy just

down the road. Well, these sorts of things are hard to find in Venezuela and have to be taken in from abroad, and so opening up the airways and

opening up the runways of the airport surrounding Caracas and the most affected areas, is clearly the most important task in the hands of the

authorities right now.

As well as, of course, continuing the first emergency response and trying to locate as many survivors as possible. We're now talking about 12, 14

hours after those quakes first struck the city, and so time is running out for those people that are still alive, but under the rubble, unfortunately.

GIOKOS: Stefano, thank you so much for that update. Appreciate your time and your reporting. Well, still to come, extreme heat is multinational

records across Europe. We'll head to Paris for our live reports. Stick with CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:20:00]

GIOKOS: France, Spain, and the UK are all breaking heat records as a powerful heat dome tightens its grip on Europe. In Paris alone,

temperatures topped 40 degrees Celsius, Wednesday, only the fourth time in 150 years the French capital has reached that level, as France grapples

with record-breaking temperatures.

A debate is intensifying over whether the country should expand access to conditioning to protect the vulnerable. Saskya Vandoorne is in Paris right

now. She joins us. Saskya, I'm sure it's unbearable. Doesn't help when you don't have access to air conditioning. How are you coping? How is everyone

trying to stay cool?

SASKYA VANDOORNE, CNN PARIS BUREAU CHIEF: Eleni, everybody is struggling. We have been hearing from people here who are unable to rest at night

because the temperatures are so high. So, they've been heading to public parks to go and sleep to try and find some respite.

And we're here in front of the Canal Saint Martin in Paris now. Usually, you're not allowed to swim here, but authorities have opened up some parts

of the canal, so that people can call off. And you may be able to see that there are also some lifeguards here, and that is because authorities are

urging people not to jump into rivers, not to swim in unauthorized swimming spots.

Just yesterday, the government spokeswoman said that 43 people have died drowning since last Thursday in France. So that is a very high number. But

authorities are stressing that this is a public health emergency, especially for the elderly and for young children. They've taken many

measures, for example, over 10,000 schools have either closed or they've shortened the school day, because the buildings here just do not have air

conditioning.

Hospitals are also under a lot of strain as they try and deal with this influx of patients. But here in Paris, we've been meeting with people who

are just trying to break the heat, trying to stay cool. And here's Victor (ph). Victor (ph), how are you coping?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, it's really, really hard to endure such heat. We can, like, we try to do anything we can to endure that kind of heat today.

So, staying inside, finding some fresh spots, just like here near the Canal Saint Martin, or in some parks. But, honestly, it's really, really

complicated.

VANDOORNE: Have you ever known this kind of heat before?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, no. For me, at least, it's the first time I've been saying that to some friends yesterday, and it's the first time for me

experiencing such a heat wave, and I don't know how we will do for during the next couple of years. So, yeah, it's really, really hard.

VANDOORNE: And as I was saying, a lot of buildings here, a lot of households do not have AC. People are divided as to whether it should be

installed in households across France or whether we should be thinking more about the environment. What's your take?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, I think ACs are definitely an option for households, but I know that there's right now a shortage in ACs and in

France, but I think the issues are more with the urban plannings in French cities, so you will need more trees, more parks, more green areas to just

find some fresh air.

So, I think that's the main issue for the next couple of years.

VANDOORNE: Brilliant. Thank you so much, Victor (ph). Eleni.

GIOKOS: Yeah. I mean, really good points there, you know, making sure cities remain green. Look, we're no stranger to temperatures like that,

Saskya, here in the UAE, but we have access to aircon. So, listen, keep safe, stay hydrated. Thank you so much. All right, still to come, the back-

to-back earthquakes in Venezuela felt far beyond the country's borders.

Venezuelan families in Madrid are anxiously waiting for updates from loved ones that's back home. So, we bring you a live report that's coming from

Spain. That's all up just after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:25:00]

GIOKOS: Let's get to the latest on our breaking news. As our rescuers are racing to reach survivors after two powerful black to back earthquakes

rocked Venezuela, the largest to hit the country in more than a century. They were both centered on the north of the country.

At least 164 people are dead, and more than 970 injured. Though it's feared that many more casualties will emerge in the hours and days to come,

Venezuela's Acting President has declared a state of emergency with security forces deployed across the country. She says talks are underway

with International Monetary Fund to provide an initial $200 million loan for rebuilding.

Residents, meanwhile, have been describing the chaotic moments immediately after Wednesday's tremors.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARTHA ANEZ, EARTHQUAKE SURVIVOR: I leaned out onto the balcony, screaming, we're trapped, we need help, please someone come. We didn't realize there

were two aftershocks back-to-back. We thought it had lasted a minute, maybe a minute and a half, but it felt endless.

On top of that, we couldn't get out. There was hammering from one side and kicking from the other. Everybody, I don't know who actually rescued us,

because they were shouting, get away from there, we're coming, and we're about six until they finally burst the door.

ERIK MARTINEZ, EARTHQUAKE SURVIVOR: I was at home in Petunia Building, first floor. I felt everything fell on top of my home, of my apartment. I

managed to cover myself with the furniture. The building did not collapse completely. I mean the apartment. And I asked for help with a bottle, a

thing, and made a noise.

I had to wait for about two hours, so that they noticed that I was still alive. They said, talk, talk, talk, and so I talked.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GIOKOS: Well people in Caracas spend the night outdoors, especially as they fear new aftershocks. Camille Rodriguez gave us this update.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CAMILLE RODRIGUEZ, JOURNALIST: We're here in Altamira Square, where dozens of people have gathered to spend the night after a series of earthquakes

rattled to the Venezuelan capital. People have decided to take their plastic chairs and even some tents to try to stay safe from any possible

earthquakes happening again in the city.

Residents in this area describe moments of panic as soon as they felt that everything was crumbling around them, so they've decided to stay under the

sky instead of going back into their own apartments. Some of them, as you can see over here, are trying to stay outside in tents or have just

gathered some blankets and power banks.

For this time in the early morning, there's a lot of people here, usually it's a lot emptier.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GIOKOS: Well, CNN's Pau Mosquera has the latest from Madrid, Spain. Pau, really good to have you with us. Spain has one of the largest communities

of expatriate Venezuelans, and you know loved ones are trying to make contact with people potentially impacted. Give me a sense of what you're

hearing.

[09:30:00]

PAU MOSQUERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Eleni, it certainly has been a long and difficult night for many here in Spain, because as you were saying,

Spain is home to the largest Venezuelan community in all of Europe, with around 700,000 people living in here, and one in every six of them live

here in the capital, in Madrid. And actually, during the morning, some of them came here to this Venezuelan consulate that you can see here behind

me.

Most of them came for routine paperwork, but the conversations amongst them quickly turned into their main concern right now, the situation of their

families and relatives back home, because a lot of tons of them have been anxiously awaiting since midnight local time for any news, any kind of

information of their loved ones, because it was at midnight here, time of Madrid, when the earthquakes struck Venezuela, but since then, they got no

information at all.

Everything that they have learned, every video that they have seen, it has come through social media. Now they are anxiously waiting for any kind of

detail of their relatives of their loved ones. We actually had the chance to speak to some of them, and that's what they had to tell me. Take a

listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: With a lot of worry and a lack of information, because we only have the same information the media is giving us. Some relatives

outside the highest risk zone have let us know that they are OK, just minor damage. But as for those in the highest risk zone, I, for example, haven't

had any contact with them so far.

MOSQUERA: Which relatives do you have in that area?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have several relatives, but I'm especially concerned about an aunt who usually stays in Caracas, and some cousins. I'm just

praying they're OK.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's intense because it happened right at midnight after 12:00 a.m. and it's really hard because obviously my parents are

there. Thank God, my mom is fine. There was only damage to the apartment building's lobby structure. As for my relatives in Caracas, specifically in

the El Paraiso neighborhood, I haven't been able to reach them. I'm just waiting to hear from them.

How are you dealing with the uncertainty?

MOSQUERA: Anxious, incredibly anxious, honestly.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MOSQUERA: It's also worth noting, Eleni -- since the early hours of the morning, most of the European heads of state government have taken the

social networks to express their condolences and send some support to the Venezuela population. And actually, for example, from France, they have

announced that they will be sending 85 rescue workers and another 80 from Switzerland to try to help the local task force that is now working to try

to find everybody that is beneath the rubble, Eleni.

GIOKOS: Yeah, all right. Pau Mosquera, thank you so much for that update. We're now joined by Jeffrey Park, who's a Professor of Earth and Planetary

Sciences at Yale University. Jeffrey, really good to have you with us. I mean, what a moment to be, you know, having this conversation these twin

earthquakes in northern parts of Venezuela.

Some experts say that this is a rarity. Take me through what you're reading into the 7.2 and then 7.5 magnitude earthquakes.

JEFFREY PARK, PROFESSOR OF EARTH &PLANETARY SCIENCES AT YALE UNIVERSITY: Yes, it is common for a large earthquake to have multiple ruptures on

different parts of a single fault system, but typically these will occur one right after the other, so it seems as though it's all inside of a

single earthquake.

What's unusual about this case is that you started with a deep rupture, maybe 20 kilometers, maybe 15 miles beneath the surface, that was the 7.2

earthquake, and then nothing for almost a minute, and then a much larger earthquake, but also much more shallow, only about 6 miles or 10 kilometers

depth, and that later earthquake and larger earthquake was going to cause a great deal of damage.

The closer an earthquake like that is to the surface, the more damage it's going to occurring, and ground shaking.

GIOKOS: Yeah, absolutely. I'm just thinking about, you know, buildings, and of course, ensuring, you know, the in terms of the structural damage. I

also want to talk about the aftershocks that we're anticipating, because typically you get many aftershocks that come up within seven days of the

initial earthquake.

Give me a sense of what we should be anticipating in the next few days.

PARK: We should be anticipating significant aftershocks, maybe magnitude six or above. It's possible that we'll go through the next few weeks

without earthquakes of that size, aftershocks of that size, but I would be -- I would anticipate them. Another earthquake, maybe about a magnitude 7,

I would think, could be quite unlikely, although not impossible.

[09:35:00]

Smaller earthquakes, though, magnitude 5 or so, especially if they are shallow, could also cause serious structural damage in the neighborhoods

above them, directly above them.

GIOKOS: Yeah, I mean, we were talking to our meteorologist a little earlier, and she was describing that typically you get one that would be

6.5 magnitude, another of 10 of 5.5 and possibly even 100 of 4.5 magnitude in terms of aftershocks. This is extraordinary.

PARK: Yes.

GIOKOS: I mean to think of the overall numbers in already, you know, an area that have been structurally, you know, compromised because of the

shallowness of that second earthquake.

PARK: Yes, 10 magnitude 5s, 100 magnitude 4.5 that would not be surprising to me, but magnitude 4.5 are you know, are going to cause some damage, but

they're not going to cause the kind of damage that we've just had from the magnitude 7, but they will cause people to be much more unsettled and

concerned, and you know, anytime that the ground shakes, you're worried that it could be something much, much larger.

So, I think that the residents will be on edge for several weeks.

GIOKOS: So, let's talk about the epicenter of the earthquake, and just how far you know away it was felt. I mean, you know, we saw buildings, you

know, collapsing in Caracas, Bogota in Colombia, also reporting feeling the earthquake. Tell me about sort of the spread and the core in the periphery,

so to speak.

PARK: OK, well, this earthquake is occurring apparently along a known fault system, a plate boundary between the Caribbean plate and the South American

plate, but it's not one that has ruptured very much in about the last century. However, it has the potential, has always had the potential to be

to host an earthquake of this size.

It's similar to say the San Andreas Fault near San Francisco, which has not had a great earthquake 100 years, not since 1906. So, it's -- to a

geologist, this is not a surprise. It's always been a dangerous zone with earthquakes potentially of this size, and areas both to the east and west,

extensions of this fault have now suffered some strain associated with this rupture that was yesterday.

So, they are maybe a little bit more on edge for larger earthquakes in the future. See, seismologists' kind of distinguish between aftershocks, which

occur on the same fault system that ruptures in a large event, and earthquakes that follow it, that may be triggered, that are on other fault

systems that have been loaded with a few more bars of stress as a result of a nearby earthquake.

And that is a danger that could occur in the next month or in the next decade. The earth is actually not, doesn't always tell us how long the next

one is going to take. But one can --

GIOKOS: We -- look there is also rain predicted over the next few days. Yeah, go on.

PARK: Yes. yes, most of what's predicted over the next few days are going to be aftershocks within the same rupture that occurred yesterday, because

after a fault ruptures, it does -- it relieves a lot of the stress, but on a small scale, there are still areas within the rock of the crust that has

had its stresses increased a little bit, and so it will continue to relieve that extra pressure for days and weeks after the main shock.

GIOKOS: All right, Professor Jeffrey Park, really good to have you with us. Thank you so much for that insight. All right, we're going to very short

break. We're back after this. Stay with CNN.

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[09:40:00]

GIOKOS: Welcome back. Now, Mexico finished a perfect three wins from three, but the official, unofficial mascot, Merlin the Duck, was not allowed to be

there due to FIFA's regulations to unpack this decision, this new policy, we have Amanda Davies joining us now. What happened, Amanda?

AMANDA DAVIES, CNN WORLD SPORT: Stories you didn't expect to be covering today. Hey, Eleni, the star of this World Cup, Merlin the Duck. There'd

been a campaign for Mexican fans to get Merlin to attend their final group stage match. You might remember he actually had the honor of meeting the

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum earlier this week.

But still FIFA said for animal welfare reasons there are no animals allowed inside the stadiums for their matches. So poor Merlin wasn't able to be

there and celebrate with everybody in the stadium and the whole country as they made there that perfect start or end to their group stage campaign.

GIOKOS: Yeah.

DAVIES: But I think the campaign will go on as Mexico's tournament goes on. But we've got more on that, and Brazil breaking Scottish hearts, and a look

ahead to the U.S. as well, coming up in just a couple of minutes in "World Sports".

GIOKOS: I think I should get Merlin a presidential suite with his other duck friends to enjoy the game. I leave it there. Amanda, you'll have dates

afterwards. I'll be back at the top of the hour. Stay with CNN.

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