Juchitan,
At least 36 people died when the most powerful earthquake to hit Mexico in over eight decades tore through buildings, forced mass evacuations and triggered alerts as far away as Southeast Asia.

The 8.1 magnitude quake off the southern coast late Thursday was stronger than a devastating 1985 temblor that flattened swathes of Mexico City and killed thousands. This time damage to the city was limited as the quake was deeper and further from the capital.

A spokesman for emergency services said nine people died east of Oaxaca in the state of Chiapas, where thousands of people in coastal areas were evacuated as a precaution when the quake sparked tsunami warnings.

Waves rose as high as 2.3 ft in Mexico, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre said, though that threat passed.

The US Geological Surveysaid the quake’s epicentre was in the Pacific, 54 miles southwest of the town of Pijijiapan at a depth of 43 miles. John Bellini, a geophysicist at the USGS National Earthquake Information Centre in Golden, Colorado, said Thursday’s quake was the strongest in Mexico since an 8.1 temblor struck the western state of Jalisco in 1932.

Authorities reported dozens of aftershocks, and President Pena Nieto said the quake was felt by around 50 million of Mexico’s roughly 120 million population, with further aftershocks likely. He advised people to check their homes and offices for damage and gas leaks.

“It almost knocked me over,” said Gildardo Arenas Rios, a 64-year-old security guard in Mexico City’s Juarez neighborhood, who was making his rounds when buildings began moving.

The southern town of Juchitan in Oaxaca state, near the epicentre, was hit particularly hard, with sections of the town hall, a hotel, a bar and other buildings reduced to rubble. “The situation is Juchitan is critical; this is the most terrible moment in its history,” said mayor Gloria Sanchez after the long, rumbling quake that also shook Guatemala and El Salvador nearby to the south.