West Valley Residents, Businesses Begin Clean-Up Following Earthquake

WEST VALLEY CITY, Utah – The clean-up work began for many residents and businesses that were severely impacted by a 5.7-magnitude earthquake that rattled the Wasatch Front.

Most of the damage was in Magna and West Valley City where dozens of homes were destroyed off 7200 West and 2600 South.

As crews returned Thursday to assess the damage in the Western Estates mobile home park, residents also arrived home.

Deemed unsafe or restricted. Many residents returning home to assess the damage this morning and start the cleanup after yesterday 5.8 #earthquake. Dominion Energy also working to repair the gas so homes can have heat again. Details on @KSL5TV pic.twitter.com/Ga6G383YHm

— Felicia Martinez (@felicia_Velarde) March 19, 2020

“They’re really bad, they’re really bad,” Mayra Tepox said after looking around at her neighborhood.

Her family stayed the night with her parents in Stansbury following the quake. She said she feels very fortunate that their home stayed intact.

“Yes, very, very lucky,” said Tepox.

49 homes were deemed either unsafe or restricted while other homes were reported to have no gas.

“We have no gas. We have lights, but we have no gas,” said Tepox.

Dominion Energy and other contractors were on site as early as 7:30 a.m., making repairs so families could have heat again. Tepox said she’s working with what she has.

“I can’t cook, but I have a microwave and we are making sandwiches right now,” she said. “My kids, I’m trying to calm them down because they don’t want to stay.”

She said they felt the 3.3 aftershock as soon as they returned home Thursday morning. It had her questioning whether or not they’ll stay.

“It seems every time we keep coming back – we came back last night and we got one last night, we came back today in the morning and we got another one today,” she said.

Dominion Energy said their goal is to get gas back into the units by the end of the day Thursday, but it may fall into Friday.