A search-and-rescue team was using a tractor to move heavy rubble in northern Venezuela’s coastal city of Catia La Mar when they saw movement, stopped to dig with their hands, and found a small dog alive in the arms of a dead woman.
Rescuers pulled out the frail 2-year-old French poodle named Beyli to give him water before recovering the body of his owner, 44-year-old Ismely Omaira Guillén Cortesía, from the dust of the apartment building in the Páez community’s Bloque 3.
Beyli surfaced on July 23 after surviving 29 days under the rubble.
“Because it is a miracle from God; I never thought he could be alive,” said Guillén’s 11-year-old daughter, Victoria Isabella Rengel, who wasn’t home and survived the earthquakes on June 24.
Victoria’s father, Jairo Rengel, said his daughter was visiting a relative when the 7.2 and 7.5-magnitude earthquakes destroyed the apartment where she lived with her mother in a 14-story building.
The earthquake’s official death toll surpassed 5,545 people this week. Victoria was also grieving her maternal grandmother and was among the newly homeless in La Guaira.
A veterinarian in Playa Grande treated Beyli and reported that he suffered severe dehydration and ulcers in both eyes, but his condition was stable, and he had a good prognosis.
“He was malnourished,” Victoria said about Beily.
Jairo Rengel said Beyli also survived a fire that broke out amid the devastation. He said he also survived the ongoing movement of heavy machinery.
“It’s a miracle,” he said in Spanish next to his daughter. “It really is a miracle.”
Related social media posts
@victoriarengel31 rescatado 29dias después debajo de los escombros un milagro de Dios, Sígueme para que veas su recuperacion
♬ sonido original - 𝓛𝓲𝔁_𝓜𝓾𝓼𝓲𝓬❤️🩹
@victoriarengel31 Hoy le doy gracias a DIOS y a estos hombres y mujeres que trabajaron duro para sacar a mi perro con vida después de 29 días del terremoto cuando los rescatistas de otros países dieron a todos por fallecidos mi perro seguía con vida . gracias DIOS por este milagro que hicistes para mí aunque no lograron sacar a mi madre y mi abuela con vida . hoy tengo a mi perro conmigo sano en pronta recuperación ❤️🩹#terremoto #catialamar #esperanza#fe#nuevasoportunidades ♬ sonido original - Victoria Isabella ❣️
@victoriarengel31 sobreviviente del terremoto despues de estar 29 días bajo los escombros lo sacaron hoy 23 de julio quién me pueda ayudar 04127006219
♬ original sound - Victoria Isabella ❣️
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