{"id":529130,"date":"2026-07-02T09:57:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T09:57:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/529130\/"},"modified":"2026-07-02T09:57:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T09:57:09","slug":"rescuers-close-to-quake-survivor-trapped-for-eight-days","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/529130\/","title":{"rendered":"Rescuers close to quake survivor trapped for eight days"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hundreds of rescuers were struggling today to unearth a 43-year-old Venezuelan man trapped for eight days under a collapsed building after twin earthquakes killed almost 2,300 people.<\/p>\n

An international rescue team inched closer to Hernan Gil, a security guard buried inside his booth under the seven-story building where he worked in Catia La Mar, a coastal area almost entirely razed to the ground in the June 24 catastrophe.<\/p>\n

“This is truly a miracle,” Mr Gil’s wife Gusbimar Gonzalez said.<\/p>\n

“I’m completely amazed because it’s the first time I’ve seen so many countries come together like this to save a single person,” she said.<\/p>\n

Rescue teams from seven countries – Venezuela, Chile, the United States, Portugal, Costa Rica, El Salvador, and Mexico – have been working around-the-clock over the past three days to reach him.<\/p>\n

They were almost one metre (three feet) from his position overnight, rescuers said, but working carefully to avoid the further collapse of nearby structures damaged in the quakes.<\/p>\n

“This is a rather complicated structure to access,” Cristian Vera, the leader of the Chilean rescue team said.<\/p>\n

“It wasn’t easy to reach the exact spot where the victim was located.”<\/p>\n

\"CARACAS,
\nInternational rescue teams are taking part in the search for survivors<\/p>\n

Though hopes rose for one man’s rescue, Venezuela faces a disaster that has left many without shelter and desperately short on food. In addition to the dead, tens of thousands of people remain unaccounted for.<\/p>\n

Venezuela’s interim president Delcy Rodriguez declared seven days of mourning, saying the country’s “soul is torn apart by the human losses.”<\/p>\n

The majority of collapsed buildings in the hardest-hit city of La Guaira, just north of Caracas, have been marked with the letter ‘D’ for ‘deceased’ – a sign they had been searched with no signs of life found.<\/p>\n

“Time isn’t wasted in a place where there is no expectation of recovering people alive,” said Javier Rodes, the coordinator of a Spanish rescue team whose sniffer dog Nala searched in vain through the rubble for traces of life.<\/p>\n

There have been miracle survivors, such as a three-year-old boy found alive on Tuesday, six days after Venezuela’s most powerful quake in over a century.<\/p>\n

But experts say trapped victims are unlikely to survive more than 72 hours.<\/p>\n

“No one is coming out of here, alive or dead,” said Jose Rafael, standing among the ruins where his son is missing in the town of Caraballeda in La Guaira state.<\/p>\n

Venezuela’s National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez said yesterday that the number of deaths had risen to 2,295, and more than 11,000 people were injured.<\/p>\n

He said almost 13,000 people had been left homeless.<\/p>\n

\"LA
\nVenezuela’s National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez said that deaths had risen to 2,295, and more than 11,000 people were injured<\/p>\n

Fight for food<\/p>\n

Venezuela’s National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez said that deaths had risen to 2,295, and more than 11,000 people were injured.<\/p>\n

He said almost 13,000 people had been left homeless.<\/p>\n

The United Nations estimates 50,000 people are missing.<\/p>\n

The two powerful quakes, measuring 7.2 and 7.5, shattered entire neighbourhoods in oil-rich Venezuela, which has suffered decades of economic crisis that devastated infrastructure and health services.<\/p>\n

The country is in a fragile transition six months after the United States ousted leader Nicolas Maduro, and lives under constant pressure from Washington for access to Venezuela’s oil and other natural resources.<\/p>\n

The US has around 2,000 personnel assisting in the response, General Francis Donovan, the head of US Southern Command, told journalists.<\/p>\n

With daily life in ruins, the focus is now shifting to survival. Many are homeless and food and water are becoming scarce.<\/p>\n

\"Continuan
\nThe United Nations estimates 50,000 people are missing in Venezuela<\/p>\n

“They give out supplies here, but sometimes people nearly kill each other for food… It’s like a cockfight,” said one person after waiting to get food at an emergency shelter.<\/p>\n

There has been widespread theft and looting and four police officers were yesterday arrested after being caught by residents stealing valuables from the rubble.<\/p>\n

Queues for aid are growing longer by the day, with many surviving on the goodwill of volunteers and donations from fellow citizens.<\/p>\n

“Here, we were receiving nothing until last night when they started bringing water,” said 56-year-old Fatima Berroteran, who has been sleeping with her family in a parking lot since their home in a high-rise complex in La Guaira collapsed.<\/p>\n

The World Food Programme on Tuesday appealed for $50 million to feed some 500,000 people for three months in Venezuela.<\/p>\n

Fears of disease outbreaks rising<\/p>\n

World Health Organization spokesman Christian Lindmeier said health services in Venezuela were under “extreme pressure.”<\/p>\n

“There’s an increased risk now of outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases” such as measles and diphtheria, due to low pre-earthquake vaccination coverage, he said.<\/p>\n

The quakes likely damaged or destroyed 58,870 buildings, according to a preliminary assessment of satellite data published by NASA.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hundreds of rescuers were struggling today to unearth a 43-year-old Venezuelan man trapped for eight days under a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":529131,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[246,61,60,82],"class_list":["post-529130","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529130","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=529130"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529130\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/529131"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=529130"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=529130"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=529130"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}