It is a very complex rescue. I have multiple buildings leaning into that building.
Six days after two powerful earthquakes struck Venezuela's coast within a minute of each other, a 44-year-old security guard remains alive beneath the rubble of a collapsed building in La Guaira — a single thread of survival woven into a disaster that has claimed more than 1,900 lives and displaced nearly two million people. International rescue teams, including crews from the United States, are working with painstaking care around unstable structures that threaten to collapse further, holding both urgency and caution in difficult balance. The story of Hernan Gil Flores has become a focal point for a region grappling with loss on a scale that resists easy comprehension — a reminder that amid catastrophe, the effort to save one life carries its own profound weight.
- A man has been conscious and uninjured in an underground parking booth for six days, sustained by water passed through the rubble and the knowledge that rescuers are close.
- The rescue is not simply a matter of digging — multiple surrounding buildings have shifted and now lean into the collapse site, making every move a calculation against secondary disaster.
- International teams, including Los Angeles County firefighters, are working methodically through what their task force leader calls 'a very complex rescue,' where speed and safety pull in opposite directions.
- Beyond the single rescue, the scale of destruction is staggering: over 1,900 confirmed dead, tens of thousands missing, and nearly 59,000 buildings damaged or destroyed across the region.
- Coastal La Guaira has become nearly uninhabitable, pushing displaced families — including a mother of three who lost her home entirely — into tents and inland shelters as 1.8 million people await humanitarian aid.
Six days after two earthquakes — measuring 7.5 and 7.2 — struck Venezuela's coast within a minute of each other on the evening of June 24, Hernan Gil Flores remains alive in the basement parking garage where he was working when the ten-story building above him came down. He is 44 years old, conscious, and uninjured. Rescuers have managed to deliver water to him, and his wife has been in contact with the teams working to reach him. That he has survived this long is, by any measure, remarkable.
What stands between Flores and freedom is not simply rubble but the geometry of the collapse itself. Neighboring buildings have shifted and now lean into the site, creating a precarious and unstable environment where a single miscalculation could trigger further destruction. Manny Sampang of the Los Angeles County Fire Department, one of several international crews on the ground, described the operation as 'very complex' — a careful understatement for work that demands both precision and endurance under dangerous conditions.
The disaster surrounding this one rescue is immense. More than 1,900 people have been confirmed dead, with tens of thousands still missing. NASA satellite data indicates nearly 59,000 buildings have been damaged or destroyed. The United Nations estimates 1.8 million people — including nearly 700,000 children — now need humanitarian assistance. Venezuelan officials report that rescue teams have pulled 6,400 survivors from the rubble so far, among them an 18-day-old infant and his mother.
In La Guaira, the coastal city at the epicenter of the destruction, daily life has effectively ceased. Residents who are able are fleeing inland toward Caracas in search of shelter and safety. Marianae Hernandez, who lost her home, is now living in a tent with her mother and three children, trying to hold herself together for their sake. 'What we are going through right now is very difficult,' she said — words that carry the full weight of a region still in the earliest, most fragile hours of a long recovery.
Six days underground in a security booth, and Hernan Gil Flores is still alive. The 44-year-old guard was working in the basement parking garage of a ten-story building in La Guaira when two earthquakes—measuring 7.5 and 7.2 in magnitude, arriving within a minute of each other—brought the structure down around him on the evening of June 24. International rescue teams, including crews from the United States, are now racing against time and the physics of a collapsing city to extract him from the rubble.
What makes the rescue extraordinarily difficult is the geometry of destruction. Multiple buildings have shifted and now lean into the structure where Flores is trapped, creating an unstable puzzle that rescuers must navigate with extreme caution. Any wrong move could trigger a secondary collapse. Manny Sampang, a task force leader with the Los Angeles County Fire Department who traveled to Venezuela to assist, described the operation plainly: "It is a very complex rescue." The teams are moving methodically, aware that speed and safety are in constant tension.
Flores's wife, Gusbimar Gonzalez, has been in contact with rescue workers who have managed to reach her husband. He remains conscious and uninjured—a fact that has sustained hope through six days of entrapment. Rescuers have been able to deliver water to him, a small but vital lifeline in the darkness below the collapsed building.
The scale of the disaster extends far beyond one man. The two earthquakes, which struck just after 6 p.m. local time, have killed more than 1,900 people with tens of thousands still missing. Satellite data from NASA suggests that nearly 59,000 buildings across the affected region have been damaged or destroyed entirely. The United Nations reports that 1.8 million people—nearly 700,000 of them children—now require humanitarian assistance. Venezuelan officials say rescue teams have pulled 6,400 people from the rubble so far, including an 18-day-old infant and his mother, who were extracted after 32 hours trapped in a collapsed high-rise.
The worst devastation is concentrated in La Guaira, a coastal city that has become nearly uninhabitable. Residents who can leave are fleeing inland toward Caracas, the capital, searching for shelter and basic survival. Marianae Hernandez lost her home entirely. She, her mother, and her three children are now living in tents, and she is trying to hold herself together for the sake of her children. "What we are going through right now is very difficult," she told reporters, her voice steady despite the weight of that understatement.
As rescue teams continue their delicate work around Flores's location, the broader humanitarian crisis deepens. The region faces a long recovery, and the focus remains split between the immediate rescue operations and the sprawling need for shelter, water, food, and medical care across a devastated landscape. For now, the work continues in the rubble of La Guaira, where one man's survival depends on the precision and endurance of teams working in conditions that grow more dangerous with each passing hour.
Notable Quotes
It is a very complex rescue. I have multiple buildings leaning into that building that we are trying to rescue him from.— Manny Sampang, Los Angeles County Fire Department task force leader
I'm trying to be strong because I have children and I don't like them to see me cry. What we are going through right now is very difficult.— Marianae Hernandez, displaced resident living in tents with her family
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
Why is this particular rescue so difficult when teams have already pulled thousands of people from the rubble?
It's the building itself. Multiple structures are leaning into the one where he's trapped. Move one thing wrong and the whole thing could shift. It's like trying to extract a card from the bottom of a house of cards that's already half-collapsed.
But his wife says he's conscious and uninjured. Doesn't that make it easier?
It helps psychologically—you know he's alive, you can communicate with him. But it also means you have to get him out alive. You can't just dig. You have to engineer your way through.
Six days is a long time to be trapped. How is he still okay?
Water helps. Contact helps. Knowing someone is coming helps. But there's a limit to how long anyone can survive in those conditions. Every day that passes is a day closer to that limit.
The numbers are staggering—1,900 dead, 1.8 million needing help. Does one man's rescue matter in that context?
It matters because he's still there. Because his wife is waiting. Because the world is watching. And because if they can get him out, it's proof that even in the worst conditions, rescue is possible.
What happens after they get him out?
Then they move to the next person. And the next. And meanwhile, the city has to figure out how to shelter nearly two million people with almost nothing left.