The search for survivors in Venezuela advanced at critical hours this Sunday, four days after the earthquakes that caused at least 1,450 deaths, while the president in charge, Delcy Rodríguez, asked to maintain these efforts and announced plans to care for the people who lost their homes due to the numerous collapses.
The work of national and foreign rescuers continued, mainly, among the ruins of buildings in the coastal state of La Guaira (north, adjacent to Caracas), the most affected by the earthquakes of magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 last Wednesday and where logistics centers of the international teams are installed. Governments of other countries updated the figures of their deceased compatriots on Sunday, including 17 Spaniards. Among the missing, 150 more compatriots are registered.
There are still at least 45,000 people missing and rescue teams are working to find answers and, if possible, lives. Although with the passing of the hours the possibilities of rescuing someone injured are reduced, the Government of Caracas assured that 33 people have been rescued alive for now. Among them, the baby who has become the face of hope.
There, among the tons of cement, dust and despair that cover the state of La Guaira, in the north of Venezuela, the one hardest hit by earthquakes, was a newborn, barely 18 days old, named Juan David. Nearby, his mother, Dayana Patiño. Both have been rescued safe and sound after being buried for more than 32 hours under the rubble of a collapsed residential building. His story has become the beacon of light for a national tragedy of historic proportions.
The dramatic rescue occurred in the Playa Grande sector, in the coastal town of Catia La Mar, one of the areas hardest hit by the brutal succession of earthquakes that shook the country last Wednesday, June 24. The feat was not a matter of miraculous heavy technology, but of the stubbornness of a family and a community that refused to give up. The baby’s father and his uncles, supported by a human chain of neighbors provided only with buckets, shovels and their own hands, led the search.
It was the muffled cries of little Juan David and the muffled screams of Dayana that guided the volunteers through the concrete maze. After an agonizing day of work against the clock and under the light of improvised spotlights, the miracle materialized: at 11:00 p.m. on Thursday, the rescuers extracted the baby, wrapped in a blanket, with extreme care.
An hour later, already in the early hours of Friday, his mother suffered the same fate amid the outburst of joy and tears from those present. “Sister, I love you, we did it! The glory goes to God!” cried one of the relatives in a video that has gone around the world on social networks.
Both were urgently transferred to the El Ávila Clinic, in Caracas. Against all medical prognoses, doctors confirmed that both the mother and the newborn are stable and do not have fractures or serious injuries.
A country in ruins
The story of Juan David and Dayana momentarily relieves the pain of a country plunged into chaos. Last Wednesday, two powerful consecutive earthquakes of magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 on the Richter scale shook northern Venezuela in an interval of just 39 seconds. The United States Geological Survey (USGS) has already classified them as the most destructive earthquakes that have hit Venezuelan territory since 1900.
The official figures provided by the authorities continue to increase as the brigades manage to enter the affected areas and the panorama drawn by the United Nations is even more bleak: the organization estimates that the number of missing people could rise to 50,000 people and that the catastrophe affects in one way or another more than 6.7 million citizens.
The situation on the ground is extreme. The streets of La Guaira have become improvised camps where thousands of families sleep outdoors or in their cars, terrified by the more than 200 aftershocks recorded and fearing losing track of their loved ones if they leave. While international aid from up to 16 countries – including Spain, France, Colombia and the US – is deployed at forced marches with canine and health teams, social indignation is growing at the lack of heavy machinery and the slowness in institutional coordination.
However, in the midst of the desolation and the smell of destruction that emanates from the collapsed blocks, the image of little Juan David emerging unharmed from the bowels of the earth reminds the thousands of rescuers that, as long as a thread of voice can be heard among the stones, there is still room for life to make its way.
