PORT-AU-PRINCE—Marjorie Louis was sitting in her kitchen eating dinner when she felt the house shaking, but she didn’t get up.

“I didn’t think it was going to be serious … and was waiting for it to stop. But I noticed it wasn’t stopping and finally tried to get up off the table but just couldn’t get up,” said Ms. Louis, a banker who lives in Delmas. “I looked outside the window and saw a large cloud of dust and started to hear my children screaming.”

Ms. Louis was considered among the lucky, having survived an earthquake that killed thousands of her countrymen. A few days after the seismic tremors, stories of survival, death and destruction continue to engulf this mountainous Caribbean nation of roughly 9 million people.

Her story is similar to those of millions of others after Haiti’s capital was hit with this seismic disaster. Thousands of people were killed and caught under the rubble for the same reason. They didn’t believe this was “the one” and were completely caught off guard. Haitians explained how mini-earthquakes had become the norm in recent years. But they never imagined that this catastrophe would happen in their lifetime.

“Now I know that not leaving the house and making my family leave was a mistake. I feel so empty and helpless, ” Ms. Louis said.

According to a Haitian doctor, “there is a five second rule. If you count to five and it keeps shaking, that’s when it’s serious.” Unfortunately, this one lasted longer than five seconds. But by the time a person finished counting, it was too late to escape.

Lyvee Memon, who had just arrived home from a funeral at Sacred Heart Church—a historic landmark that was completely destroyed—was in her living room when the tremors began. She couldn’t believe it was the real thing and planned to wait for it to stop until the walls fell all around her. She survived and was pinned under the rubble. “I was able to find a small little hole that only a child could fit through to make it out,” Ms. Memon said days later.

Herold Guillaume was driving along Nazon Road when his green Toyota sedan began bouncing. He thought someone was hitting his car. He looked up to see buildings falling all around him. Debris fell all around him as the sky was quickly covered with powdered substance.

“I left the car and walked home all the while thinking about my father who was home alone,” Mr. Guillaume said.

Emmanuel Jean was on the top floor of his three-story home and his father was in the study on the first floor. The robust building crumbled like matchsticks and Mr. Jean said he barely escaped.

“I ran downstairs and looked for my father and got him out,” said Mr. Jean, an electrical engineer. Since then, Mr. Jean has been living in his backyard while making arrangements to join his mother and sisters who live in Long Island.

“I’m still in shock,” he said. “I never expected this would come. Now we have to start our lives from nothing. I don’t know what we’re going to do.”