When the deadly 7.4 magnitude earthquake struck Colombia on Monday, Brian Osorio Zuluaga ran out of his office in Cali and raced home on his motorcycle. The sight of a collapsed five-story residential building forced him to stop. “It was a large complex, covering an entire block,” Osorio told CNN. The earthquake was the strongest to hit Colombia in more than a decade and caused residents and neighbors of the building, La Torres del Limonar, to flee into the street, “some in sleepwear or pajamas; some crying, others in shock,” Osorio said. He approached the rubble and began shouting through the rubble for survivors, despite warnings about a possible gas leak. He suddenly asked those around him for silence. A faint sound emerged from the rubble, barely a whisper. “Yes, I’m here. I’m with a baby,” a man’s voice responded. Osorio described how he and several others began moving debris with their hands to reach the couple. But a large concrete slab blocked their path. “On the first try, we couldn’t lift it,” he said. Then, “we all got up together: one, two, three, up.” The slab was too heavy to throw aside, and Osorio worried there might be more people trapped underneath. Some volunteers held him up while others cleared a path to the baby. “You can see the baby’s head there, which at that moment looked a little purplish because he couldn’t breathe,” Osorio said. “Once we started removing the debris, the baby started to…breathe and his color started to return.” Video of the remarkable rescue filmed by Osorio shows the tiny baby in a dusty suit being carefully pulled from the rubble. A man, his arm bloodied, can be seen lying awkwardly on his side, still half trapped under a concrete board. Osorio said they handed him the baby, a boy, and handed him to a police officer, who took him to an ambulance. They then turned their attention to freeing the trapped man. Among the debris, Osorio said he saw clothes, shoes and a stuffed animal covered in dust. He thought about the people who might still be trapped. “All those thoughts go through your mind,” he said. The bravery of everyone who rushed to help was what saved the lives of both the man and the baby. “There is strength in numbers, because no single person could have lifted that piece of rubble; it was so big and so heavy,” he said. “It is better to act than to stay still,” Osorio added. “Everything helps.” Search and rescue operations began their third day early Wednesday, as emergency services raced to find more survivors after the powerful earthquake that struck western Colombia and killed more than 200 people, according to a CNN tally based on reports from officials. The earthquake struck the heart of the country’s coffee-growing region and catapulted communities into a state of national disaster as world leaders offered aid and assistance. The European Union has mobilized its Copernicus satellite service and is providing funds to help the response, the bloc’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said. In Cali, a woman was pulled from under a mountain of rubble on Tuesday to cheers as firefighters carried her out on a stretcher after a complex multinational rescue operation. And in Pereira, a CNN team on the ground saw rescuers and volunteers form a human chain to remove debris and help save those trapped in an apartment building. “There are people who have joined and you can see they are wearing everything from sports clothes to shorts to tennis shoes; they are not prepared for this,” CNN senior national correspondent David Culver said from the site. “We have seen scenes like this spread throughout Pereira. This is one of the most affected areas.” But in the epicenter of Monday’s earthquake, Chocó, an indigenous leader told CNN that aid has not yet reached the area, the poorest region in Colombia. Víctor Chamapuro, leader of the Wounaan “Buenavista” Indigenous Reserve on the San Juan del Chocó Coast, said that “all our houses are on the ground.” “Where are we going to sleep now? We have to be alert now, we are going to sleep outside,” he said. Wounaan indigenous community in the department of Chocó says their houses are “on the ground” Wounaan indigenous community in the department of Chocó says their houses are “on the ground” 0:20 Chamapuro called on authorities to send food and medicine, saying that one person from the community was injured. The “Buenavista” reserve can only be reached by boat, a five-hour trip from the port of Buenaventura, on the Colombian Pacific coast. The video sent by Chamapuro from the reserve shows flattened buildings that appear to be built with wood and corrugated iron sheets. Others are still standing, but with varying levels of damage. The earthquake is one of the first major challenges for Colombia’s new far-right president, Abelardo de la Espriella, who took office just last week and has vowed to harshly attack left-wing criminal and militant groups in Colombia. De la Espriella announced on Tuesday economic aid measures for those affected by the earthquake and financial support for people who have lost their homes to rent temporary housing.
