Cuernavaca, Mexico — The strongest earthquake felt in Mexico for almost 100 years appears to have caused minimal damage to the country's plastics industry.
The 8.1 magnitude quake struck 10 minutes before midnight on Thursday, killing at least 34 people in southern Mexico, authorities said.
“We stopped production as a normal procedure due to this event but everything went back to normal after 30 minutes,” said Roberto Rodríguez Layún, managing director of Fischer SA de CV, a blow and injection molder in Córdoba, Veracruz state.
Among major molders, Fischer was among the closest to the earthquake's epicenter, which was off the coast of Chiapas, several hundred miles away.
The initial tremor and aftershocks were felt strongly in Mexico City, 190 miles northwest of Córdoba, and across much of neighboring Central America.
The mountainous regions of Chiapas and the state of Oaxaca sustained some of the worst damage. The federal government said 25 people were killed in Oaxaca state.
President Enrique Pena Nieto said operations at the Salina Cruz refinery in the Oaxaca were temporarily suspended as a precautionary measure, Reuters reported.
A man who answered the telephone in the press office at Volkswagen AG's giant assembly plant in Puebla, which lies between Chiapas and the Mexican capital, said the complex had not suffered any damage.
National plastics industry association Anipac did not immediately respond to a Plastics News request for information on damage, if any, suffered by its members.
Fischer's Rodríguez said more danger lay ahead. “Now we're preparing for [Hurricane] Katia's arrival later this afternoon. I hope everything will be fine.”