Two 11-year-old boys were separately rescued from collapsed buildings in Venezuela within hours of one another after powerful earthquakes struck the country.
Video of the first boy, identified as Moises, showed rescuers pulling him from twisted concrete and debris as onlookers applauded. His eyes were shielded from the sun as he was carried to safety. Colombia’s National Unit for Disaster Risk Management (UNGRD) said he had been buried under about three metres of rubble and that rescue teams carried out six hours of careful, “high-precision” work to reach him. Reuters reported that a rescuer later said Moises was found near his sister and mother, who had died in the collapse.
Hours later interim president Delcy Rodríguez posted video on X of a second 11-year-old being carried down a large mound of wreckage on a stretcher. “In these hours, every life is hope for Venezuela,” she wrote.
The rescues come after two powerful tremors — measured at magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 — struck within 39 seconds. Officials have confirmed at least 1,430 deaths, and tens of thousands of people remain unaccounted for. It has been more than 85 hours since the first quake, but search teams continue to work, saying survivors might still be alive under the rubble if they have access to food and water.
Hundreds of buildings collapsed when the twin quakes hit, especially in the coastal La Guaira region, where the town of Caraballeda was among the hardest hit. Aftershocks have repeatedly shaken the area, slowing operations and unnerving residents. Families have been digging manually through concrete and broken masonry to reach loved ones; some say they can hear people below but cannot move the heavy slabs without heavy machinery.
Thousands of people are sleeping in cars, at the airport and on the grounds of a local golf course, which has been turned into a makeshift hospital, donation centre and staging area. Donated clothing and aid are being sorted there, and a strip of land beside a small lagoon on the course is serving as a helicopter landing pad for incoming supplies and personnel. Nearby, streets remain cracked and coated with dust, punctuated by the rumble of earth-moving equipment and the calls of searchers.
The José María Vargas sports complex in La Guaira is another emergency response hub. Rodríguez said the armed forces were sorting clothes, medicine and food and urged people not to feel alone as national and international aid arrives. Still, frustration has grown over what some describe as a slow and uneven government response; in communities such as Caribe and Tanaguarena, debris removal has reportedly not yet begun.
International teams have come from Mexico, Spain, Qatar, the United States and the United Kingdom, among others. The UN’s Tom Fletcher said 39 search-and-rescue teams have been deployed from around the world—each typically 50–100 people—totaling almost 2,000 personnel, 111 search dogs, medical teams and specialized equipment including small “micro” drones used to probe inside damaged buildings for signs of life.