From Chile

Dear family and friends,

We are alive and we are well.

We've been without electricity, phone, and internet at our house since the quake jolted us out of bed this morning at 3:30 am, so we've found out very little about the quake. By now you probably know more than we do about the damage and loss experienced in certain parts of Chile. We've heard bits and pieces from some of neighbors, who have been able to tune in to different radio signals, but not much. Right now I'm trying to catch up - we're over at Hanzi's sister's house now, as she has her basic services back up and running by now. I'm taking in some of the devastation and damage as I type.

Some parts of Chile got hit hard. 8.8 or 8.9 on the Richter scale. We're about 8 hours driving distance from the epicenter, so for us it was somewhere between a 5 and 6 earthquake. This was Hanzi's second big quake, but for the rest of us it was a first... and I hope a last. Suddenly, our whole house started groaning and shaking. Hanzi and I simultaneously ran to yank the girls out of their beds - Katelyn kept crying out "are we going to die?!!!" "are we going to die?!!!" as we huddled together under two of our bedroom doorways. Halfway through the quake things started falling and breaking. A glass vase fell off its table and exploded, just about the time our tv also fell onto the floor, along with a bunch of DVDs and CDs. Stuff in the bathroom was falling and breaking. We couldn't really tell what, because by that time the lights had gone out. The noise in itself was awful. And the shaking went on forever (almost two minutes they are saying) though it seemed like a lot longer. Our house has a lot of glass windows close to the entrance, and though none of them broke, we decided to stay in and not risk making a run for the outside. Finally it subsided, and as there is always a risk of a tsunami along the coast, and our house is about 300 yards from the beach (although about 150 feet above sea level) we gathered up some essentials (flashlight, billfold, keys, jacket) and headed out the door to seek higher ground. Two blocks away from our house I decided to stop at a nearby gas station and spent what cash I had left (it's the end of the month) to halfway fill our vehicle. I'm glad I did...

Okay, here comes another shake... oh, boy, this is a big one... hang on... I'm looking at the neighbors' apartment windows and they're shaking like jell-o!! I've never seen that before!! 15 seconds... 20 seconds........... allright. it's gone now. We've been feeling aftershocks since last night at 30 minute intervals, but that was the biggest one so far. I didn't know glass was so flexible... that was amazingly weird!!

As I was saying, I'm glad I was able to put some gas in the tank at 3:50 am, because then the line was only 4 cars long. Today the line stretches for about 2 or 3 blocks!

Damage here in Algarrobo was minimal. Our house has no visible cracks or signs that a quake hit, although several things broke as they fell from shelves (picture frames, vases, CD cases, those kind of things). Surprisingly, everything in our kitchen came out intact. Missy, our little Cocker Spaniel who spends the night in the kitchen, did lose half of the contents of her bladder somewhere through the quake. Had to clean that up. Didn't get any warning signs from her... she can fetch, though, and sit upon command, and stay, so I'll cut her some slack this time.

Oooh, that was another short jolt. It's only been a couple of minutes. Everybody is definitely a little jumpy today, as you can imagine.

The yacht club dock took the worst hit around here. The tide has been falling and rising every 10 minutes and creating quite a current as it does, so the dock was pretty much wiped out - some of the yachts and boats tied to the dock were either sunk or severely damaged.

The rest of Chile, particularly further south of us, took some heavy damage. A 22 story apartment building simply fell over on its side from the base. Most of the buildings' occupants were miraculously rescued, though I believe there were some deaths involved in that one. Bridges collapses, highways are unusable. Major stuff.

But here, we're doing good. Still a little shaky, but thankful for God's protection over us. We appreciate your prayers so very much!! Be praying that God will use this as a way for people to come near to Him. Thinking about that... we had a lady get saved in our prayer meeting in our home on Thursday night. So, God's power has been very evident to us in these last few days, in every aspect. Will attempt to keep you updated as things develop. Would post pictures, but the battery died and is recharging. You know, typical earthquake deal...

We love you!!

David & Hanzi Thompson