This seemed obvious once the pictures started coming in that showed us while no Haiti, the destruction caused by the 8th largest earthquake in recorded history made organizing a poker tournament an afterthought:
The official word, via @PokerStarsBlog:
The PokerStars.net Latin American Poker Tour (LAPT) regrets to announce that the 2010 LAPT Viña del Mar, Chile poker festival has been cancelled. The festival was scheduled to be held at the Enjoy Viña del Mar Casino and Resort from March 19-23, 2010.
All players who have qualified or bought-in to the event will be fully refunded their buy-ins and any out-of-pocket expenses*.
This cancellation follows a devastating 8.8-magnitude earthquake that struck Chile approximately 175 miles south of Viña del Mar on February 27, 2010. The cancellation of the festival has been forced by the effects of the earthquake and in light of the rescue and recovery efforts now taking place throughout Chile.
Everyone at PokerStars.net and the LAPT offers their thoughts and condolences to all of those affected by this tragic natural disaster.
The LAPT sincerely apologizes for this cancellation to the players that had planned to attend the festival.
*Players should contact lapt@pokerstars.com with any queries
You gotta chalk natural disaster up to a bad beat, but man, the LAPT seems to really be having troubles getting off the ground (even with all the soccer stars they\’ve got pimping). I could see LAPT dropping down from a projected #2 spot to a #4 in terms of prestige amongst the PokerStars tours … behind EPT (obv), NAPT, and APPT.