A magnitude 7.1 earthquake rocked central Mexico on Tuesday, September 19, 2017 killing about 55 people as buildings collapsed in plumes of dust and thousands fled into the streets in panic.

The quake came less than two weeks after another quake left 90 dead in the country’s south, and it occurred as Mexicans commemorated the anniversary of a 1985 quake that killed thousands.

Mexican media broadcast images of multiple downed buildings in densely populated parts of Mexico City and nearby Cuernavaca. A column of smoke rose from a structure in one central neighborhood in the capital.

Morelos Gov. Graco Ramirez reported on Twitter that at least 42 people had died in his state south of Mexico City.

Gov. Alfredo del Mazo told the Televisa news network that two people died in the State of Mexico, which also borders the capital: a quarry worker who was killed when the quake unleashed a rockslide and another person who was hit by a falling lamppost.

Rescue workers rushed to the site of damaged or collapsed buildings in the capital, and reporters saw onlookers cheer as a woman was pulled from the rubble.

Rescuers immediately called for silence so that they could listen for others who might be trapped.

Gala Dluzhynska said she was taking a class with 11 other women on the second floor of a building on the trendy Alvaro Obregon street when the quake struck and window and ceiling panels fell as the building began to tear apart.

She said she fell in the stairs and people began to walk over her, before someone finally pulled her up.

“There were no stairs anymore. There were rocks,” she said.

They reached the bottom only to find it barred. A security final came and unlocked it.

The quake caused buildings to sway sickeningly in Mexico City and sent people throughout the city fleeing from homes and offices, and many people remained in the streets for hours, fearful of returning to the structures.

Alarms blared and traffic stopped around the Angel of Independence monument on the iconic Reforma Avenue.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the magnitude 7.1 hit at 1:14 p.m. (2:15 p.m. EDT) and it was centered near the Puebla state town of Raboso, about 76 miles (123 kilometers) southeast of Mexico City.

Puebla Gov. Tony Gali tweeted that there had been damaged buildings in the city of Cholula including collapsed church steeples.

Earlier in the day workplaces across the city held readiness drills on the anniversary of the 1985 quake, a magnitude 8.0 shake, which killed thousands of people and devastated large parts of Mexico City.

Market stall vendor Edith Lopez, 25, said she was in a taxi a few blocks away when the quake struck. She said she saw glass bursting out of the windows of some buildings. She was anxiously trying to locate her children, whom she had left in the care of her disabled mother.

Local media broadcast video of whitecap waves churning the city’s normally placid canals of Xochimilco as boats bobbed up and down.

The Associated Press reports that Mexico City’s international airport suspended operations and was checking facilities for any damage.

Much of Mexico City is built on former lakebed, and the soil can amplify the effects of earthquakes centered hundreds of miles away.

The new quake appears to be unrelated to the magnitude 8.1 temblor that hit Sept. 7 off Mexico’s southern coast and which also was felt strongly in the capital.

U.S. Geological Survey seismologist Paul Earle noted that the epicenters of the two quakes are 400 miles (650 kilometers) apart and most aftershocks are within 100 kilometers.

There have been 19 earthquakes of magnitude 6.5 or larger within 250 kilometers of Tuesday’s quake in the past century, Earle said.

Earth usually has about 15 to 20 earthquakes this size or larger each year, Earle said.

Initial calculations show that more than 30 million people would have felt moderate shaking from Tuesday’s quake. The US Geological Survey predicts “significant casualty and damage are likely and the disaster is potentially widespread.”

The Federal Republic of Germany on Friday, September 15, 2017 deposited its instrument of ratification, thereby becoming the 76th future Party to the Minamata Convention.

This is the second ratification of the global pact after it entered into force and became legally binding on Wednesday, August 16, 2017. The first nation to ratify the treaty after it entered into force and became legally binding is the Republic of Namibia, which on Wednesday, September 6, 2017 deposited its instrument of ratification, thereby becoming the 75th future Party to the Minamata Convention.

Prior to the entry into force, Brazil on Tuesday, August 8, 2017 deposited its instrument of ratification, thereby becoming the 74th Party.

Earlier, Kiribati (July 28) and Syria (July 26) deposited their instruments of ratification to become 73rd and 72nd Parties, while Jamaica on Wednesday, July 19, 2017 became the 71st Party to the mercury convention.

Hitherto, the Governments of Rwanda, Palau, Thailand, Slovenia and Viet Nam deposited their instruments of ratification, thereby becoming the 66th to 70th future Parties to the mercury treaty.

The depositions were made on Wednesday, June 21; Thursday, June 22; Friday, June 23; and Thursday, June 29, 2017. While Palau deposited on Wednesday and Thailand on Thursday, both Slovenia and Viet Nam did likewise on Friday. Rwanda followed up a week later on Thursday.

Previously, Iran and Estonia had ratified the Convention, which has already entered into force, thanks to the landmark rash of ratifications on Thursday, May 18, 2017 that triggered the entry into force of the mercury accord, having garnered the required 50 ratifications.

On that day, the EU and seven of its member States – Bulgaria, Denmark, Hungary, Malta, the Netherlands, Romania and Sweden – deposited their instruments of ratification at the UN Headquarters in New York, bringing to 51 that day the number of future Parties.

To commemorate the historic development, United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP), Ministry of the Environment of Japan, Kumamoto Prefecture and Minamata City on Saturday, July 1, 2017 held “Celebrating Event for the Minamata Convention on Mercury – Voice from Minamata towards the Entry into Force” in Minamata City, Kumamoto, Japan.

The 1st Conference of the Parties to the Minamata Convention (COP1) will gather governments, intergovernmental and non-governmental organisations from around the world in Geneva from September 24 to 29, 2017.

The Minamata Convention on Mercury (“Minamata Convention”) is a new international environmental convention for global community to work collaboratively against mercury pollution. The Minamata Convention aims at achieving environmentally sound mercury management throughout its life cycle. The Convention was adopted at the diplomatic conferences held in Minamata City and Kumamoto City in October 2013.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres and global leaders from local governments, the private sector and civil society on Monday, September 18, 2017 agreed to accelerate efforts on climate action and to implement the Paris Agreement at a meeting during the UN General Assembly High Level Week.

The discussions herald a new phase in efforts aimed at mobilising and scaling up transformative action that will allow the world to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement on climate change. They also recognise that the coalitions that have come together to develop and adopt the Paris Agreement must now shift their focus to implementation.

Leaders identified a set of sectors to aggressively push for low carbon pathways which included technology, the transition to cleaner energy, setting a realistic price on carbon, and insurance, reducing the risks from disasters and the impacts of climate change.

The meeting was part of a series of informal discussions organised by the Secretary-General with world leaders, from both government, private sector and non-governmental organisations, to forge alliances between governments and business for implementing the Paris Agreement in the run-up to a Summit he will hold in 2019.

The Secretary-General will also meet with a group of heads of state and government on climate issues on Tuesday.

Among those attending the meeting were California Governor, Edmund G. Brown Jr; Michael R. Bloomberg, UN Special Envoy for Cities and Climate Change; former Vice President, Al Gore; Climate Champion Hakima El Haite, Morocco, Inia Seruiratu; Climate Champion, Fiji, Patrick Pouyanne; CEO of Total, Safa’ Al Jayoussi; Executive Director of the NGO IndyAct, Jordan; and Manual Pulgar Vidal, from the World Wide Fund for Nature WWF.

The Secretary-General applauded the efforts of Mr. Bloomberg – including with the Global Covenant of Mayors, the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures, and the America’s Pledge initiative – to lead efforts driving climate action across a wide range of society. “I will lean on him as my Special Envoy to accelerate and deepen the role of sub-national actors in the implementation of the Paris Agreement in preparation of the 2019 Climate Summit.”

“Addressing climate change requires leadership from the groups that have the most direct connection to emissions – cities, regions, and businesses,” said Mr. Bloomberg. “I look forward to supporting the Secretary-General as the UN brings these non-national actors to the table to drive even more ambitious climate action.”

“Climate change, if unchecked, threatens all humanity,” said California Governor and UN Climate Change Conference Special Advisor for States and Regions Edmund G. Brown Jr. “California, with purpose and resolve, will join with the rest of the world to decarbonise the economy.”

Businesses and local governments are increasingly playing an out-sized role in advancing climate action – often surpassing the efforts of national governments. Cities, at the forefront of efforts to build resiliency and companies, businesses and investors have vastly increased action to reduce their global carbon footprint. But there is no formal mechanism to recognise and measure these contributions toward the goals set out in the Paris Agreement.

Mr. Gore said, “We are still behind where we should be in solving the climate crisis, but we see the path forward. Mobilising and engaging local, state and regional governments, businesses and investors and community organisers in the implementation process of the Paris Agreement is absolutely essential.”

Mayor Stephany Uy-Tan of Catbalogan, Philippines, welcomed the initiative to engage representatives from non-party entities. “It’s good to know that you’re not along in pushing for lower emissions. We cannot do this alone. This helps us move faster for our constituents and to help the lives of our people.”Safa’ Al Jayoussi, the Executive Director of the NGO IndyAct in Jordan, said “Getting all the actors in the same room as the Secretary-General is extremely important to us. It is really important as civil society to have our voices heard.”

The destruction and loss of life due to extreme weather events, such as the recent storms that ravage the Caribbean region and South Asia, have added an additional impetus for action.

Mr. Guterres said, “We count the costs in lives, livelihoods and damaged economies. Since 2008, some 20 million people a year have been forcibly displaced by floods, storms, fires and extreme temperature.”

He added, “Climate change is not a distant problem for future generations,” Mr. Guterres said. “It is here, now, and we need to deal with it.”  He added that governments alone cannot handle the enormity of the challenge.

The Secretary-General said the commitments under the Paris Agreement are still insufficient to limit global temperature rise to well under 2°C. “There is at least a 14 Gigaton gap,” he said. “That is why I asked you here today. We can change this situation. I hope, together, we can emphatically bend the emission curve by 2020.”

The Secretary-General called for boosting efforts to mobilise financing and creating bankable projects, and to intensify efforts in high impact areas such as in key areas that will result in the largest emission decreases and greatest efforts to build resilience to the more intense storms and impacts of climate change.

This informal dialogue was the first concrete step towards the Secretary-General’s Climate Summit in 2019, the dialogue will focus on engaging Heads of State and Government for enhancing leadership and building informal coalitions in key areas as well as outlining steps towards an accelerated transformation that continues to drive emissions reduction together with sustained economic growth.