In the Atlas Mountains, early September, a 6.8 magnitude earthquake hit near the town of Ighil and the Oukaïmeden ski resort. Numbers collected above 2,500 deaths and twice the amount of injuries.

With an epicenter 73.4 km southwest of Marrakesh and a magnitude of bare minimum 6.8 was the Marrakech-Safi Earthquake of 2023. This is not the first of its kind; earthquakes of 6.4 in 2006 and 6.3 in 2016 hit Morocco. The country is accepting limited foreign aid.

“It looks like they are not letting rescue teams come in, they’re not getting help. They’re saying they can be more of a hindrance than a help if they all rush in and aren’t coordinated. I could see that being true but also it seems like they need some kind of help and it’s really unfortunate that the death toll is so high,” American Government teacher Rachelle Donnelly said.

Most of the villages are still left in rubble, with cleanup coming day by day. Many are left to rebuild the damage nature has caused.

“Unfortunately there was no damage that we could have prevented, this event was purely nature spiraling out of control,” junior Sebastian Baad said.

And spiral it did. The Earthquakes have impacted over 300,000 people in plenty of ways. With local housing being deconstructed to waking from sleep to tremors.

“You could hear the quakes from many miles away without feeling a thing,” Baad continued.

Many are left affected including those a large distance away. Some impacts have yet to leave their mark. “I’m not at all impacted by this event, however the effects against our country is Heavy. Morocco was a big contributor in the efforts against antiterrorism efforts in other countries,” Baad commented.