American students in Chile are safe following the 8.8-magnitude earthquake that rocked the country on Saturday, according to numerous news-media reports.
Although the earthquake’s epicenter was 200 miles southwest of Santiago — a popular study-abroad destination for American students — the capital city suffered structural damage, including collapsed buildings and damaged roads.
It could not immediately be determined if Chilean students, academics, or higher-education officials were among the more than seven hundred people already confirmed as dead in the quake.
But the six students studying in Santiago from Tufts University are safe, as are six students from Loyola University Chicago and three from Northern Arizona University, according to university officials. Two students from Millersville University of Pennsylvania, which maintains a partnership with the Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaíso, are also safe.
St. Cloud State University, in Minnesota, also has a partnership with the University of Concepción, in Concepción, a city hard hit by the earthquake, but no St. Cloud students were on the campus at the time, according to a university official.
Those safe also include 21 students from Syracuse University, 15 students from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, two students from George Washington University, and two students from the University of Oklahoma. Two graduate students and two professors from the University of Maine at Orono were also unharmed.
Twenty-six Stanford University students and faculty and staff members in Santiago are safe, though one student suffered fractures when she jumped off a balcony during the earthquake. Stanford’s international-study center in Santiago was expected to reopen on Monday.
Earlier reports indicated that students from the Universities of Colorado at Boulder, of Notre Dame, of South Carolina at Columbia, and of Tennessee at Knoxville were all safe.