Colombia earthquake: woman pulled alive from rubble after 36 hours
Rescuers in Pereira freed a 32-year-old woman alive after she spent 36 hours trapped under a collapsed building following Colombia's magnitude 7.4 earthquake. Search efforts continue as another person remains trapped in the same structure.
Rescue teams in Pereira, Colombia, pulled a 32-year-old woman alive from the wreckage of a collapsed building on Tuesday, August 11, after she had been trapped underneath for 36 hours. The woman, identified as Daniela Largo Sánchez, was carried out covered with a blue sheet to shield her privacy before being placed in an ambulance.
Footage from the scene showed rescuers applauding as she was brought out of the debris.
Firefighters from Bogota said crews had actually located Largo Sánchez around 10 hours before she was finally freed, but she was buried too deep for an immediate rescue. Teams then worked cautiously through the rubble to reach her without triggering further collapse of the structure.
Search continues
The rescue took place as emergency crews kept combing through damaged buildings across western Colombia in the aftermath of the magnitude 7.4 earthquake that struck on August 10. Firefighters noted that another person is still trapped in the same building in Pereira, where rescue operations remain ongoing.
