Teens who fled Venezuela after quake disaster are caught up in 7.4-mag Colombia tremor: ‘The earthquake is haunting me’

TWO teenage brothers who fled Venezuela after a devastating earthquake have been caught up in another deadly tremor in Colombia. Deivi Delfín, 15, and his brother Winder, 17, moved to neighbouring Colombia after two back-to-back earthquakes struck in late June. Deivi found his grandmother buried in the rubble Credit: Instagram/printed news Winder discovered his mum and younger brother below a slab on concrete Credit: Instagram/printed news As they headed home on June 24, quakes measuring 7.2 and 7.5 struck just 39 seconds apart. Their 12-storey apartment building in La Guaira was reduced to rubble, trapping family members inside. Sign up for The Sun newsletter Thank you! For the next month, the brothers desperately sifted through the wreckage in search of their loved ones. Then Deivi spotted a scrap of fabric buried beneath the debris. The brothers moved to Columbia to live with their dad, Deivid (left) Credit: Instagram/printed news The 15-year-old immediately recognised it as part of his grandmother’s floral skirt. Firefighters later confirmed they had recovered the body of a woman. Winder then made a heartbreaking discovery of his own when he found his mum, Yusmani, buried beneath a huge slab of concrete. As rescuers carefully lifted the concrete, they discovered the brothers’ ten-year-old sibling, Moissés, clinging tightly to his mother. Most read in The Sun “When his little head fell into my hand, I broke down,” Winder said. After spending weeks searching for their relatives, Deivi said he and his brother no longer felt like children. The devastating earthquake killed more than 6,000 people and prompted the brothers to move to Cali, where their father, Deivid, works. Just three days after arriving in the Colombia’s third largest city, they felt the earth move beneath them once again. Emergency crews search through rubble in Cali Credit: Getty Debris strewn across a collapsed church at Palermo neighborhood in Tamesis Credit: Getty Home to around 2.2 million people, at least 95 people were killed as hundreds of building to rubble. Deivi was asleep when the tremor began and initially thought he was dreaming. As the shaking intensified, he jolted upright and raced downstairs, with Winder doing the same. Outside, the brothers clung to a metal gate as they waited for the violent shaking to stop. When they finally found their dad outside the barbershop where he worked, they were quick to reassure him. “Dad, stay calm. We’ve been through this before,” they told him. “Tears came to my eyes and everything, because I was afraid of what I had already experienced, what my children had experienced,” Deivid said. “I don’t want anything to happen to my children.” Residents and rescue workers search for survivors in Pereira Credit: Getty A crushed car in Pereira after the 7.4-magnitude quake Credit: Getty The 7.4-magnitude quake struck at a depth of around 64 miles in Chocó province and was felt across a vast area of western Colombia. Tremors were felt hundreds of miles away in Venezuela’s capital Caracas, as well as in Ecuador and Panama. Officials said 281 people have been confirmed dead and 379 remain missing, with the death toll expected to rise in the coming days Colombian President Abelardo de la Espriella has deployed 1,000 members of the security forces to Cali following reports of looting. The disaster is an early test for the president, who was inaugurated just days ago on August 7. On Tuesday, he flew to Pereira with his wife, First Lady Ana Lucía Pineda, to inspect one of the worst-hit areas. “My commitment is to each and every one of the affected families,” he wrote on X. “We remain on the ground, working for our people.” US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said America “stands ready to support” Colombia. The US Department of State described the disaster as “devastating” and pledged £11.5million to provide emergency shelter and supplies. The EU is also providing funding and supporting rescue operations, foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said. The Colombian government has meanwhile announced an immediate emergency rent subsidy for people who have lost their homes. Comment now