Less Than A Minute

It began the way most mornings do. Flags rising, coffee cooling, the ordinary rhythm of a city waking up. Then, at 7:39 a.m. local time, the ground beneath the southern Philippines began to move — and it would not stop.

The magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck offshore, near Sarangani province at the southern tip of Mindanao. It was the strongest to hit the country in 36 years. In General Santos, a port city of more than 700,000, people did what they had been taught: they crouched low and waited for it to pass. But it didn't pass. As walls began to lean and concrete cracked, waiting was no longer the safe thing — and they ran into open streets, dust rising behind them.

The shaking lasted less than a minute. Its reach did not. Tsunami warnings went out across the southern Philippines, northern Indonesia, and the Malaysian state of Sabah, sending coastal residents toward higher ground before the alerts were lifted hours later. A small tsunami was recorded along nearby coasts.

By afternoon, officials were counting the cost: at least 32 people killed — mostly in collapsed buildings and landslides — and more than 130 injured. Thousands were displaced. Search and rescue teams were still working through the rubble. A morning that began like any other. A minute that will be remembered far longer.