KATY, Texas — Arianna Regardia had just gotten to her mother's house when she saw the news Wednesday night.She saw apartment buildings reduced to heaps of concrete.
She saw emergency crews digging through mountains of rubble, trying to reach people trapped deep within.She saw the devastation wrought by two powerful earthquakes that struck Venezuela's northern coast just hours earlier.Regardia immediately called her grandmother, who lives in the capital of Caracas, near the epicenter of the quakes.After a few seconds on the phone, she got an answer on the other side of the line.Her family was safe.But relief quickly gave way to a different feeling: the need to help.About 12 hours later, Regardia stood in a narrow cargo garage in this city about 30 minutes west of Houston, where bags of canned tuna, diapers and Advil lined the floor as volunteers sorted donations into cardboard boxes.Regardia arrived Thursday morning to drop off hygiene items like pads, tampons and body soap.
But shortly after, she was helping pack boxes as more and more donations came in."One thing I admire about being Venezuelan is our resilience," Regardia said, as tears welled in her eyes."Being there for each other and just supporting each other during the tough times."Regardia is one of roughly 83,000 Venezuelans living in the greater Houston area, home to one of the nation's largest Venezuelan communities, according to the Pew Research Center.
She said it's been difficult to watch the disaster unfold from thousands of miles away."Being far away from your family, and being on the outside…it's very important for us to come together and support our people," Regardia said.The Wednesday evening quakes — a 7.2-magnitude foreshock followed less than a minute later by a 7.5-magnitude quake — killed at least 235 people and injured roughly 4,300 others, according to Venezuelan officials and the U.S.Geological Survey.
Officials say hundreds of people may still be trapped under debris.On Thursd...