The earthquake that cut a path of devastation across Colombia's central coffee-growing region killed at least 517 people and injured nearly 2,000 others, authorities said yesterday.
But the number of dead in this provincial capital alone could rise as high as 2,000, according to a local fire chief.
Government officials and a statement from the presidential palace in Bogota confirmed 517 dead and 1,896 injured across a disaster zone spanning 20 towns and villages in five provinces.
But they did not rule out a dramatic increase in the official toll, saying it was very difficult to give accurate figures since corpses were being pulled by the minute from the ruins of collapsed buildings.
"It's a complete catastrophe and we will take years to rebuild the city [of Armenia]. We're finding more bodies every minute," the state Governor, Mr Henry Gomez, said.
The earthquake, among the worst recorded in Colombia, struck at 1.19 p.m. local time (6.19 p.m. Irish time) on Monday and measured 6.0 on the Richter scale.
"We have not recovered many bodies yet, only about 300," said Capt Ciro Antonio Guiza, deputy fire chief in Armenia, a city of 200,000, high in the Andes mountains.
"The calculation of the total dead could be about 2,000 dead [in Armenia]," he added.
But Mr Gomez would only confirm 326 dead in Armenia and 96 others in the adjacent community of Calarca.
Rescue workers helped by ordinary citizens stepped up the search for survivors in Armenia and Pereira yesterday, scraping feverishly through the ruins with their bare hands or with picks and shovels.
Some earth-moving equipment had been drafted into service but emergency crews did not want to use machines for fear of crushing victims who may be trapped in air pockets under tons of rubble.
Mr Gustavo Alvarez, a governor of neighbouring Valle del Cauca province who overflew Armenia at dawn yesterday, said "black squares" marked the areas of total destruction.
"Armenia is like a chess board," he said. "The white squares are the areas where nothing happened, and the black where everything collapsed."
"Everything fell in like a house of cards," said Ms Janeth Delgado, a local resident who like many others spent the night huddled around makeshift campfires on Armenia's rubble-strewn streets.
"You didn't know whether to run or stand still, everything just came crashing down," she said, sobbing.
Hercules military transport planes began flying some of the most badly injured survivors to Bogota for treatment early yesterday, as relief agencies and the army poured medical supplies into the earthquake zone.
A team of 64 rescue specialists trained in extracting survivors and bodies from rubble was due to reach the disaster scene from Miami late yesterday, and Colombian media reported a Japanese team would also arrive.
Regional authorities issued radio appeals for drinking water, portable power generators and coffins. Potable water and electricity were scarce and communications had been knocked out by the earthquake.
Already some citizens were grumbling that city officials had failed to enforce strict building standards in an area prone to frequent earth tremors.
The earthquake caused many landslides along the main routes into and out of Quindio and Risaralda provinces. But the National Coffee Growers' Federation said it had no reports of damage to the coffee crop. The President, Mr Andres Pastrana, toured the stricken area for the second day yesterday, pledging disaster relief and voicing solidarity with victims. He has cancelled a European tour that was to have included the World Bank's annual assembly in Munich and an audience with Pope John Paul II.
Colombia's National Seismological Institute said the centre of Monday's earthquake was less than 20 miles below the surface - far shallower than normal - in a mountainous region 115 miles south-west of Bogota on the borders of Tolima and Quindio provinces.
The institute reported scores of aftershocks, the largest measuring between 5.5 and 5.6 on the Richter scale. The European Union said yesterday it was making one million euros available to help victims of the earthquake. The EU's executive Commission said in a statement its ECHO humanitarian office would manage the aid, targeted at the provinces of Quindio, Risaralda and Tolima.
The EU said its aid would help fund food, essential relief items, temporary shelter and medicines.