The Lost City of Yungay
While on our trip to the high Andes, we visited the town of Yungay. This city of some 20,000 people was completely wiped away by a massive ice, rock and mud slide that rushed off the mountain in the background. On Sunday, May 31, 1970, a 7.9 earthquake hit the area causing massive damage and triggering the glacial avalanche that swept off the mountain at speeds of up to 150 mph. It hit the city only 3 minutes after the earthquake stopped. Before the earthquake and avalanche, Yungay was a thriving city, second in the area to only Huaraz in population. Afterward it was all gone, other than a few palms trees on what was the city plaza. 20,000 people were buried under the giant land slide. The former city was turned into "sacred ground", a cemetery of 20,000 unmarked graves. In 1965, just 5 years before the earthquake and landslide, the city placed a statue of Christ on top of a hill that was the town cemetery. Some 90 people survived the catastrophe by running up th...