A family's loss amid Venezuela's deadliest quake
Lucas Trejo, a 30‑year‑old Argentine defender who had been playing for Club Sport Marítimo La Guaira, was in Caracas with his teammates when the ground began to shudder. The twin quakes, separated by just 39 seconds, registered magnitudes of 7.6 and 6.8, marking the strongest tremors to hit Venezuela in more than a century.
When the shaking stopped, Trejo raced back to his beachfront home in La Guaira, only to find it reduced to rubble, with no trace of his wife Yanina or their children Aarón and Ainhoa. The devastation left the family's belongings scattered and their memory erased from the sand.
Rescue teams, hampered by a single excavator, combed through the debris, but the window to locate survivors had already closed, leaving the chances of finding anyone alive rapidly diminishing. The search effort stretched beyond the critical 72‑hour window, and hope faded with each passing hour.
The tragedy extended beyond Trejo’s family; the earthquakes also claimed the lives of fellow footballers Yimvert Berroteran, Víctor Palacios and Razan Sijaa, while Héctor Bello’s partner perished while shielding her toddler, underscoring the indiscriminate nature of the disaster.
Club Sport Marítimo La Guaira, Metropolitanos F.C. and the Venezuelan Football Federation have all issued statements of condolence, while international observers note that tourists from China, Spain and other nations were among the dead, further deepening the global impact of the quake.