CARACUS: A man has been pulled out alive after spending eight days trapped beneath the debris of a collapsed building following twin earthquakes in Venezuela.
Emergency teams rescued Hernán Gil more than 100 hours after first detecting his presence under an estimated 140 tonnes of rubble.
Rescue officials described the operation as highly complex, with a Chilean firefighter calling it “without doubt the most complex and technically difficult” mission he had faced.
The earthquakes, which struck Venezuela on June 24, have killed nearly 2,300 people, while tens of thousands remain missing.
Paramedic Allan Madrigal of the Costa Rican Red Cross, who first heard Gil’s faint calls for help, said the survivor “emerged just perfect” after the ordeal. He recalled initially doubting what he heard and asking a colleague to confirm he was not imagining it, before rescue efforts were immediately intensified.
Gil, a security guard, had been on duty in a small concrete booth in the basement parking area near the Galerias Playa Grande mall in Catia La Mar when the earthquakes hit. The structure appears to have partially shielded him from the collapsing debris.
“He has told us that he does not even have a crushed nail,” said another Red Cross worker shortly before his extraction.
During the rescue operation, Gil was given water and placed on an intravenous drip as teams from Venezuela, Chile, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Mexico, Portugal, and the United States worked to reach him. However, parts of the access tunnels repeatedly collapsed, underscoring the danger faced by both rescuers and the survivor.
Rescue teams eventually established visual contact with Gil overnight. In footage captured by a small camera inserted into the rubble, a Chilean firefighter can be heard asking him to turn toward the lens as efforts to free him continued.
(Inputs from BBC)
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