What some are calling a miracle is, in fact, the result of relentless determination and highly coordinated efforts by rescue teams in Venezuela—teams that successfully extracted a man alive from the rubble caused by two powerful earthquakes. He had been trapped for eight days.
Amid the widespread devastation and tragic stories emerging from the twin quakes, this survival offers a rare glimmer of hope—not only for the rescued man but also for families of the missing, though such hope grows increasingly fragile as days pass.
The survivor, 43-year-old security guard Hernán Gil, was pulled from the wreckage on Thursday, July 2, 2026—more than 120 hours after the disaster struck. Journalists from the French news agency AFP confirmed the rescue at the site in Catia La Mar, in the northern state of La Guaira.
Gil had been buried alive inside a security booth located in a parking structure at a building in Playa Grande. After being carefully lifted onto a stretcher, he was transferred to an ambulance bound for Caracas for urgent medical care.
Rescue operations involved over 100 specialists from seven countries: the United States, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Portugal, Mexico, Chile, and Venezuela. For more than three days, teams worked around the clock—using detectors and flexible tubes to deliver water and air to Gil while carefully excavating unstable debris.
In the final phase, nearly 30 rescuers labored nonstop at the parking site, while two specialists dug a three-meter tunnel to reach him. Moments before making contact, rescuers used an airbag to break through a final concrete slab—a delicate maneuver carried out amid the real risk of collapse from a neighboring building.
“I’ve never seen anything this difficult. I’m not even sure a rescue of this duration and complexity has ever been attempted before,” said an unnamed rescuer on-site.