Venezuela, the desperate testimony after the earthquake: “Let’s dig through the rubble”

Born 72 years ago in Venezuela, of Marche origins, Romanelli denounces ”the lack, the insufficiency of personnel” responsible for providing assistance and relaunching the ”requests for help from desperate citizens””many have lost their homes”, who are waiting for the intervention of ”the firefighters, the civil protection to pull out their loved ones who were buried under the rubble”, because ”maybe they can still be alive”. While ”the situation is returning to normal”, therefore, ”now the attention is focused on the missing, on rescue operations” and on waiting for help, including from Rome. ”The Italian consulate has taken action to help Italian citizens. Italy is sending aid” and others have been sent ”from the United States, El Salvador, Colombia”, he says.

Romanelli was at home with his family when the first tremors of the earthquake hit. ”We headed towards the door of the house and hugged each other waiting for it to pass, the shock was quite long. We later learned that they were two tremors that overlapped”, with “the second was stronger by 7.5″. In those moments ”we were scared, there was the feeling that the building could fall” and ”then we all went out into the street, even the neighbors”. Here, he says, ”someone was shouting, someone was crying, someone was praying. But fortunately there was no damage in our area”, but ”the power went out, communications were interrupted”.

With the earth stopping shaking, ”once the fear passed, after four, five hours the light returned and we got in touch with our loved ones”, says Romanelli, explaining that ”the worst situation was recorded in other parts of the city, in the areas of Los Palos Grandes, Altamira and San Bernardino”where ”buildings have fallen and there are deaths. At a national level, the most affected area is La Guaira, on the coast, the holiday resort of the caraqueños, twenty kilometers from the city, where there are dozens, dozens of buildings that have completely collapsed, many people missing, there is talk of more than ten thousand missing”.

Romanelli explains that there is a wait for the arrival of international aid, ”some has already arrived” and underlines that ”unlike 1999, when La Guaira was hit by a landslide with the overflowing of rivers and rains, and the military intervened, this time the army is not seen, but only civil protection groups and firefighters can be seen, which however are insufficient” and ”private bodies that give their do”. Speaking of the desperation of the Venezuelans affected by the earthquake, Romanelli underlines the importance of the ”reception centres” where ”food, medicines, clothes, hygiene articles” must be brought.