{"id":591223,"date":"2026-08-12T19:08:19","date_gmt":"2026-08-12T19:08:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/591223\/"},"modified":"2026-08-12T19:08:19","modified_gmt":"2026-08-12T19:08:19","slug":"every-minute-counts-as-rescuers-race-to-find-survivors-after-deadly-colombia-earthquake-colombia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/591223\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Every minute counts\u2019 as rescuers race to find survivors after deadly Colombia earthquake | Colombia"},"content":{"rendered":"

Colombian rescue workers are racing to find survivors after the country\u2019s deadliest earthquake<\/a> this century killed at least 240 people and left at least 3,000 missing.<\/p>\n

In Cali, one of the worst affected cities, firefighters said they had pulled a 35-year-old man from the wreckage of a collapsed building shortly before 4am on Tuesday \u2013 nearly 24 hours after the 7.4 magnitude quake rattled western Colombia<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have found life under the debris \u2026 Every minute counts,\u201d the fire department wrote on X <\/a>alongside a video of a survivor being rescued from beneath a concrete beam.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday afternoon there was a sudden burst of applause<\/a> after a 31-year-old woman named as Diana Troncoso was also rescued by firefighters after a 16-hour effort. \u201cGetting out of there is a miracle,\u201d her father, \u00c1lvaro Troncoso Torres, told journalists<\/a> from local newspaper El Pa\u00eds as he stood by the ruined building.<\/p>\n

Civilians reportedly pulled at least five survivors from a partly collapsed hotel, although elsewhere the bodies of some of the city\u2019s 95 confirmed victims could be seen lying on the street under sheets.<\/p>\n

Exhausted rescue workers and volunteers rest during the search for survivors in Cali. Photograph: Joaqu\u00edn Sarmiento\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Colombia\u2019s president, Abelardo de la Espriella, was sworn into power <\/a>in Cali only last Friday. On Monday night he was back in his country\u2019s third-largest city, telling reporters that 5,000 homes had been destroyed and 188 people were missing in the surrounding department of Valle del Cauca.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will get through this together,\u201d Cali\u2019s mayor, Alejandro Eder, told its 2.3 million citizens during a televised meeting with the new president.<\/p>\n

Eder said emergency responders had rescued 37 people from some of the 40 buildings that had completely collapsed in Cali. De la Espriella, who won power in June by vowing to launch a major crackdown on illegal armed groups, said more than 1,000 troops were being mobilised to avoid public disturbances amid reports of looting.<\/p>\n

The situation in Pereira, a city 130 miles to Cali\u2019s north, appears similarly dramatic, with at least 53 people reportedly trapped in some of the 58 buildings that collapsed. Eleven people are missing, according to the local newspaper El Diario.<\/p>\n

Graphic<\/a><\/p>\n

On Monday, Pereira\u2019s mayor, Mauricio Salazar, broke down in tears<\/a> as he described the damage inflicted on his city, where at least 66 deaths have been confirmed.<\/p>\n

\u201cPereira is living through a historic and tough situation,\u201d Salazar told reporters, his voice breaking as he explained how local hospitals were struggling to keep up with the influx of patients.<\/p>\n

The earthquake, which struck at 7.34am on Monday, is Colombia\u2019s deadliest since a 6.2 magnitude temblor devastated parts of the same western coffee growing region<\/a> in January 1999, killing more than 1,000 people.<\/p>\n

Colombia\u2019s president, Abelardo de la Espriella, left, was sworn in only last week. Photograph: Gabriel Aponte\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

The natural disaster poses an immediate and severe challenge to De la Espriella, a far-right populist with no experience of politics or governing who took office less than 72 hours before the earthquake.<\/p>\n

The acting leaders of neighbouring Venezuela<\/a> were castigated by civilians for what many considered their lethargic and incompetent initial response to the twin earthquakes that struck its north coast on 24 June, killing at least 6,300 people.<\/p>\n

\"BuildingsBuildings damaged after strong earthquake hits Colombia<\/p>\n

In the crucial 72 \u201cgolden hours\u201d after Venezuela\u2019s earthquakes, survivors said government officials and troops were nowhere to be seen, something widely attributed to years of economic crisis, corruption and the mismanagement of the armed forces, as well as foreign sanctions.<\/p>\n

Colombia\u2019s earthquake on Monday appears to have caused substantially less damage than Venezuela\u2019s far shallower and more destructive earthquakes. But the official reaction \u2013 at least so far \u2013 appears to have been far more organised, proactive and transparent than in Venezuela, where civilians were often left to their own devices to dig victims from the rubble.<\/p>\n

In the hours after Colombia\u2019s earthquake, De la Espriella quickly declared a state of emergency and said he would personally lead the disaster response, making a trip to the department of Choc\u00f3, before travelling to Cali. He has sent teams led by various ministers in his recently named cabinet to each of the worst affected places. Government officials have offered regular updates on the situation. De la Espriella is due to fly to Pereira on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

People search through the debris of a damaged building in Pereira, Colombia. Photograph: Carlos Ortega\/EPA<\/p>\n

Experts attribute the two countries\u2019 contrasting responses to their starkly different political realities.<\/p>\n

Venezuela has suffered more than a decade of authoritarian rule under the recently abducted dictator Nicol\u00e1s Maduro, during which time the country\u2019s institutions, media and civil society withered and international aid groups and NGOs struggled to operate.<\/p>\n

Critics have voiced fears over a possible authoritarian tack<\/a> under Colombia\u2019s recently installed pro-Donald Trump leader. But the country remains a vibrant multiparty democracy with strong institutions and an energetic civil society.<\/p>\n

Christopher Sabatini, a senior fellow for Latin America at Chatham House, believed those very different systems explained the dramatically different responses to the natural disasters.<\/p>\n

Sabatini recalled how after June\u2019s twin earthquakes, Maduro\u2019s secretive authoritarian heirs \u2013 who have retained power with Trump\u2019s blessing under acting president Delcy Rodr\u00edguez \u2013 had gone into \u201ca defensive crouch\u201d as citizens were abandoned to their own fate. \u201cThey just went quiet,\u201d in the hours after the disaster, he said.<\/p>\n

In contrast, Sabatini sensed in Colombia \u201ca quick, sharp, public-facing and immediate response\u201d from officials such as Cali\u2019s technocratic mayor, and even the controversial new right-wing president, in what was \u201can efficient, effective state\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt shows the democratic DNA of both sides,\u201d Sabatini said of the contrasting earthquake reactions in Colombia and Venezuela.<\/p>\n

Orlando P\u00e9rez, a Latin American politics expert from the University of North Texas at Dallas, also noted major differences in the responses, although he recognised that Venezuela\u2019s disaster was more severe.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody is praising de la Espriella\u2019s quick response \u2013 and I\u2019m willing to give him his due. He has reacted in a much more public way and shown leadership in an overt manner. The Colombian military has been deployed in a much more effective and quick [manner] than in Venezuela,\u201d said P\u00e9rez, noting how conservative social media influencers were explicitly pushing the comparison between Rodr\u00edguez\u2019s sluggish response and the seemingly rapid reaction of her Colombian counterpart.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut things could go south pretty quickly if the initial burst of energy and activity is not followed up with effective reconstruction and recovery and assistance for the \u2026 people who have lost their homes and their jobs,\u201d P\u00e9rez added.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have seen in other places where initial responses are positive and then recovery doesn\u2019t come quickly enough, and people get frustrated.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Colombian rescue workers are racing to find survivors after the country\u2019s deadliest earthquake this century killed at least…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":591224,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[246,61,60,82],"class_list":["post-591223","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\/591223","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=591223"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591223\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/591224"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=591223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=591223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=591223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}