Por Rey Rodríguez, CNN en Español

La tarde del 17 de octubre de 1989 el área de la Bahía de San Francisco lucía tranquila y sin gente. Ese día, miles de residentes seguían, desde sus casas, bares y restaurantes, el duelo entre los Gigantes de San Francisco y los Atléticos de Oakland, cuando de pronto fueron sorprendidos por un terremoto de 6.9 en la escala de Richter.

La sacudida se sintió unos minutos antes de iniciar el tercer juego y detuvo el evento deportivo más esperado del año para los amantes del béisbol. Según las autoridades, el sismo de ese día dejó un saldo de 67 muertos y severos daños materiales, incluidos los registrados en el estadio Candlestick Park, donde se disputaba el gran clásico de la Serie Mundial.

El recinto soportó el impacto del sismo, al igual que numerosos edificios y viviendas de la zona de la bahía, evitando una tragedia mayor. Sin embargo, después del desastre se modificaron las normas de construcción de la ciudad y se optimizó la preparación y respuesta ante futuros desastres.

Lo que ocurrió esa tarde en San francisco, hace casi 37 años, demostró que un temblor puede ocurrir en el momento menos esperado, incluso durante una celebración deportiva de alcance mundial. También dejó en claro que una mejor preparación puede ayudar a reducir riesgos y salvar vidas.

Una reflexión que cobra hoy mayor relevancia para México, país ubicado en una de las zonas con mayor actividad sísmica del mundo y que será una de las sedes, junto con Estados Unidos y Canadá, de la Copa FIFA 2026.

El evento mundialista, que arrancará el 11 de junio, atraerá a miles de extranjeros, muchos de ellos sin experiencia ante un sismo, y pondrá a prueba la capacidad operativa y de respuesta de las autoridades mexicanas.

“Ojalá que estén tomando en cuenta la posibilidad de un terremoto durante la Copa FIFA 2026”, advierte el arquitecto Iván Salcido Macías, quien recuerda que, durante el Mundial de fútbol México 86, todavía estaban frescas las huellas del terremoto del 19 de septiembre de 1985, considerado uno de los más devastadores de la historia reciente del país.

“Los capitalinos saben bien que puede temblar en cualquier momento, pero quienes vienen de afuera no”, dice el también investigador y cronista sobre la historia sísmica de la ciudad.

En lo que va de 2026, México ya registró dos alertas sísmicas reales. El 2 de enero ocurrió un sismo de magnitud 6.5 con epicentro a 4 kilómetros al suroeste de San Marcos, Guerrero, según reportó el Servicio Sismológico Nacional.

Tres meses después, el 4 de mayo, volvió a activarse la alerta sísmica tras otro temblor de magnitud 5.6 grados cerca de Pinotepa Nacional, en el estado de Oaxaca.

Salcido considera que es muy difícil prever cómo reaccionarían los turistas que nunca han vivido un sismo. “Yo creo que muchos se van a quedar congelados y ahí es donde cobra valor el nivel de preparación que tengan las autoridades para una contingencia de ese nivel”, dice.

Y añade: “La misma gente de la ciudad de México se espanta, se pone nerviosa y reacciona con miedo, imagínate aquellos que lo vivirían por primera vez. Por eso hay que adelantarse, no esperar a que las cosas pasen”.

La arquitecta Myriam Urzúa Venegas, secretaria de Gestión Integral de Riesgos y Protección Civil de la Ciudad de México, asegura que la institución que encabeza repartirá miles de folletos en los aeropuertos, los hoteles, los restaurantes, entre otros espacios públicos con información sobre qué hacer antes, durante y después de un sismo. También los distribuirán en las zonas en los que se realizarán los llamados FIFA Fan Fest.

Recomienda que, si una persona está en un segundo piso, lo mejor sería evacuar por las rutas señaladas, “sin empujar, sin gritar y sin correr”, hasta llegar al punto de concentración fuera del inmueble.

“Si nos encontramos en un tercer piso o más arriba, lo más ra

By Jack Guy, Antonia Mortensen and Juan Pablo O’Connell, CNN

(CNN) — A five-star hotel in Italy that repeatedly refused to serve a guest tap water at its restaurant did not break any laws, the country’s top court has ruled.

The woman filed a lawsuit after hotel staff said they would only serve her bottled water during a stay at the end of 2019, according to a court ruling seen by CNN. She’d argued that access to water was a fundamental right.

However, the Supreme Court disagreed, ruling that the decision not to serve tap water was lawful. The case was taken to the Supreme Court after being rejected by a court in Rome and an appeals court.

According to the ruling, the woman stayed at the Hotel Sassongher, located in Italy’s northern Badia region, between December 26, 2019, and January 3, 2020. She was on a half-board package that excluded drinks, for which she had paid 5,712 euros ($6,654).

During dinner, she’d asked to be given tap water and offered to pay for it as a service charge, but hotel staff would only provide bottled water at a price of around 7 euros ($8.15).

The guest later filed a lawsuit asking for compensation of around 2,700 euros ($3,147).

She argued that “water is a natural good and a universal human right of every individual, and that the free supply of a minimum vital quantity necessary to satisfy essential needs must be guaranteed, even in the event of arrears,” the court ruling states.

However, her lawsuit has now been rejected at the highest level of the Italian justice system, with the Supreme Court ruling that the country’s laws do not require restaurateurs or hotel owners to serve tap water.

Judges made their decision in November, but the ruling has only just hit headlines in Italy, sparking debate.

In a statement, Hotel Sassongher told CNN Wednesday that it “fully respects the decision of the Supreme Court,” but declined to provide any comment on it.

Access to tap water has exposed cultural differences between the United States and some European countries in the past.

US travelers sharing hot takes on European tap water consumption (or lack thereof) has become something of a social media trend.

Although there is no federal US law stipulating that restaurants or hotels have to serve tap water, it is a widely accepted cultural norm.

In England and Wales, restaurants that serve alcohol are required to provide free tap water by law. But in mainland Europe, things are very different.

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By Alicia Wallace, CNN

(CNN) — There’s been a “remarkable” increase over the past few years in Americans struggling to put food on the table, and that’s likely contributing to record-low consumer sentiment readings, new Federal Reserve Bank of New York research showed Wednesday.

The New York Fed updated a 2020 analysis on the disproportionate financial effects of the pandemic with newly collected data from its closely watched Survey of Consumer Expectations.

Researchers found that a greater share of Americans have become more “food insecure” than they were in May and June of 2020 and are dipping into savings to cover expenses, struggling to access food, have kids who missed meals, or are receiving food donations or federal nutrition assistance.

“We find a remarkable increase in food insecurity, particularly among lower-educated and lower-income households and households with young children,” New York Fed researchers wrote Wednesday.

Those same groups also reported increases in pessimism regarding their financial well-being.

While not necessarily causal, the association between rising food insecurity and increased pessimism points to a potential explanation as to why US consumer sentiment has been in the dumps despite economic data remaining fairly resilient, if not quite strong, researchers noted.

Income and wealth inequality have long persisted in the US, but Americans’ economic experiences and outcomes have become increasingly uneven in recent years.

This dynamic, frequently referred to as a “K-shaped” economy, is defined by a widening inequality in how lower- and higher-income Americans spend, earn and build wealth.

Those in the top half of the K have seen their household finances and wealth enriched by soaring stock prices, equity in their home and a refinancing boom that lowered mortgage payments and padded their piggy banks.

Meanwhile, those on the bottom end of the K have experienced significantly greater levels of financial stress because of the higher cost of living, the post-pandemic inflation burst and five-plus years of prices rising faster than they typically do.

“The greater financial strain due to the high cost of living, combined with the expiration of pandemic-era aid (such as expanded [Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program] benefits), have led to renewed concerns about food insecurity among those at the bottom of the K-shape,” New York Fed researchers wrote.

In February 2026, 10% of households surveyed said they didn’t have enough food, an increase from 4% in June 2020, according to the data released Wednesday. Shares of people receiving food donations increased (to 15.8% from 10.6%) as well as SNAP (17.9% versus 10.6%), and more than one-third of respondents used their savings to cover expenses (36.8% versus 21.8%).

The New York Fed survey data was gathered before the US-Israeli strikes in the Middle East that subsequently resulted in an oil supply crunch that caused a spike in gas prices and further heightened affordability concerns.

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