Rescuers pulled a 43-year-old security guard alive from a collapsed basement early Thursday, ending a grueling, days-long operation that became a symbol of hope after the devastation left by twin earthquakes that struck Venezuela eight days ago.
Hernán Alberto Gil Flores has been safely recovered after being trapped since June 24 under rubble in the basement of the Galerías Playa Grande shopping center in the coastal town of La Guaira. Rescuers initially contacted him over the weekend.
Bands carrying flags from around the world cheered as rescuers carried Jill on an orange tarp-covered stretcher through crowds of people to a Red Cross ambulance. A group of men wearing red Costa Rican Red Cross uniforms hugged each other and laughed with relief.
Rescue workers carry Hernan Alberto Gil Flores after he was pulled from the rubble eight days after being trapped by two earthquakes that struck Catia la Mar, Venezuela.
AFP Photos/Fernando Vergara
Gil Flores, who was working as a security guard on the night shift at the complex, was inside his small security cabin when the first violent quake struck. While the surrounding concrete structure collapsed around him, his workstation cabin remained firmly on the ground, protecting him from crushing debris and creating a vital pocket of air.
“When we found him, he asked us not to tell his wife that he was alive, just in case he didn’t survive,” Minear Collado, a Costa Rican Red Cross rescuer, told the Associated Press.
A specialized team from the Costa Rican Red Cross first detected signs of life and made contact with it on Sunday.
His wife, Josepimar Gonzalez, told The Associated Press that she went through days of despair before rescuers called, but then “when I knew he was alive, I saw a ray of light in the darkness.” The couple has two children, ages 8 and 10.
The operation was coordinated by an urban search and rescue team of Chilean firefighters, who worked around the clock with specialized teams from the United States, Portugal, Mexico and others.
“We would never leave him here,” Collado said before the rescue.
Rescuers successfully overcame extremely unstable structural conditions, heavy rain and constant aftershocks to reach the survivor. They used a telescopic camera to maintain constant contact with Gil Flores, passing water and liquid nutrients through a narrow column to keep it hydrated during the last three days of the extraction process.
María Paz Campos, a veteran firefighter from Chile, talked him through the entire process and kept him calm during the agonizing final hours of Thursday.
In a video posted by Chilean firefighters in the hours before the rescue, Gil Flores is seen drawing, apparently to pass the time. Campos then gently asks him to look at the camera and wear goggles.
“I want you to put on goggles, to avoid small particles that fall, to avoid them getting into your eyes,” Campos told the Venezuelan survivor.
The building’s collapse was caused by two successive earthquakes on June 24 with magnitudes of 7.2 and 7.5, respectively. Violent, shallow earthquakes damaged or destroyed tens of thousands of buildings across northern Venezuela, killing more than 2,200 people and injuring more than 11,000 others, and making La Guaira state the worst-hit region in the country.
AP video journalists Andre Rincon and Brian Antiquero contributed to this report.
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