The confirmed death toll from Tuesday’s earthquake in Mexico passed 225 on Wednesday.

The magnitude 7.1 earthquake had left countless people trapped under buildings, hoping they would be found and rescued.

For people in Waterloo Region with relatives in Mexico, the hours after the earthquake were an endless parade of waiting to hear from those family members and worry about what had happened to them.

Mauricio Bravo, who owns The Cactus restaurant in Waterloo, had relatives in a section of Mexico City known to have been hit hard by the earthquake.

With telephone lines down and many other lines of communication down – nearly half of the city lost power in the earthquake – it wasn’t until Wednesday morning that Bravo heard from his mother and brother, who were staying with another relative.

“They were OK,” Bravo says.

“They had to spend the night far from home.”

Bravo was still waiting for word on the whereabouts of many of his other relatives.

Denise Derbez has a nephew staying near Puebla, the epicenter of the quake.

“He was outside on the street when everything happened. He felt the earth shaking to the side, and then up and down,” Derbez said Wednesday.

“He’s good, but he’s all shaken. He’s very scared.”

Derbez plans to travel to Mexico next month to visit her nephew. She says being two countries away from him and other relatives makes it difficult to cope with the news of the earthquake.

With reporting by Natalie van Rooy