Hernan Gil, a survivor of Venezuela's twin earthquakes, is assisted by members of international rescue teams before being rushed into an ambulance in Catia La Mar, La Guaira State, Venezuela on July 2, 2026, eight days after the quake. Photo: FEDERICO PARRA / AFP
Hundreds of rescuers in Venezuela cheered and embraced Thursday after pulling a 43-year-old man alive from the ruins of a collapsed building eight days after deadly twin earthquakes, AFP journalists witnessed.
With the official death toll nearing 2,300 and huge numbers of people still missing, the rescue of security guard Hernan Gil after so long under the rubble was greeted as a miracle.
Gil was brought out on a stretcher after a painstaking operation to extract him from the collapsed seven-story building where he worked in Catia La Mar, a coastal area almost entirely razed to the ground in the June 24 catastrophe.
“This is truly a miracle,” Gil’s wife, Gusbimar Gonzalez, told AFP as rescuers worked to rescue him.
