Race to reach trapped Colombia survivors

At least 287 people killed by massive earthquake

BOGOTA/ PEREIRA, COLOMBIA:

Rescuers raced in Colombia on Friday to free four people from a collapsed hotel, a rare sign of hope nearly four days after one of the strongest earthquakes to hit the Andean nation in decades left hundreds dead or missing.

The operation in the coffee-region city of Pereira had become the main focus of a disaster response increasingly shifting from the search for survivors to the grim work of clearing debris and accounting for the missing.

"My son is getting married on Sunday," said Hernan Giraldo, the father of 24-year-old Juan Felipe, one of the people rescuers hope to save. "I'm waiting here to hug my son, alive. He was in that hotel room. I've been here since Monday night in case something happens, to find him."

Venezuelan rescue workers, who arrived in Pereira after searching for survivors from the devastating twin quakes that hit their country's Caribbean coast just seven weeks ago, were helping at the site with thermal imaging cameras.

"We'll always have high hopes; we've found people alive even 10 days later. The goal is to search and find people alive," said Cristian Acevedo, one of the Venezuelan rescue workers.

Colombia's 7.4-magnitude quake struck shortly after 7:30 a.m. on Monday, with its epicenter in San Jose del Palmar in the province of Choco. It toppled apartment blocks and damaged homes, schools and hospitals across western Colombia, from the Pacific port of Buenaventura to the inland cities of Cali and Pereira.

400 people missing

Authorities said on Friday 287 people had been killed and nearly 4,000 injured. Nearly 400 others were still missing. Cali and Pereira accounted for over two-thirds of those killed, and more than half the injured were in major cities.

Tens of thousands of homes were damaged and many destroyed, according to government figures, underlining the scale of a disaster that has left many Colombians sleeping in shelters or outside unsafe buildings. Reuters