This content was published on October 12, 2022 – 01:04 October 12, 2022 – 01:04
Genesis Carrero Soto
Caracas, October 11 (EFE). – Three days after the landslide in the central Venezuelan city of Las Tejerías, the relatives of those who disappeared – at least 56 according to the government – have started the search for survivors on social networks such as Twitter, where photos and desperate appeals to those who can provide information are piling up.
The tragedy has claimed the lives of at least 43 people, according to the latest official report from Executive Vice President Delcy Rodríguez, while they continue to dig and excavate homes in the area to locate those swept away by the waters. Rescue work entering a critical phase as the hours pass.
But the search for the disappeared is not only focused on the affected area, as their relatives and friends are posting ID card images, family photos and any sign showing other people their loved ones in the hope that someone will know something.
Several of these messages have been repeated by journalists and “influencers” and together they hope to find an answer or a clue that is not necessarily under the rubble and mud that has already compacted in the municipality of Las Tejerías and that does it compensates for more difficult tracking work.
“ON OUR WALK”
Ender Segovia is one of those who knows social networks, but he too has moved from Caracas to Las Tejerías, around 70 kilometers away, in the last few days to help his family find his 56-year-old uncle José Segovia on Saturday afternoon not be helped out of his house.
Inside the house, they found their one-year-old cousin already dead, whom they were unable to get out of the house as the river swept through the community.
“Everyone searches day and night trying to see if they can find people alive. People walk on the roofs of houses, walk on ours, thinking that people might be stuck there, undercover,” the man said.
Like many affected by this disaster, Segovia believes that the number of those who have disappeared exceeds the official figure and warns that the chances of finding their loved ones alive are decreasing as the hours go by.
Although, he adds, “hope is the last thing lost.”
LOOK EVERYWHERE
At the scene of the disaster, public and private institutions, international organizations, students, rescuers, family members and organized individuals are mobilizing aid to support the 10,000 families in the 23 sectors affected by the overflowing torrents.
“The work is tedious because the affected area is very large,” Nelson Suniaga, a firefighter from the Central University of Venezuela who spends several hours in the mud of this small town in Aragua state, told EFE.
The days of helping survivors and finding those who have disappeared, he said, would be carried out “in community” between state officials and volunteers, an effort that the government said exceeded 3,000 people.
The rescuer emphasizes the solidarity he feels there is in the area where, given the scale of the disaster, everyone who arrives begins their work by responding to a family’s request or by tracking down a “distinctive smell”. , in no particular order.
“The task is to seek, seek, seek until you find. We spent all day digging where they told us where something was suspected, where there was a distinctive smell, but we didn’t find anyone,” Suniaga said. EFE
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