New Delhi:What was supposed to be the beginning of a new chapter after deportation from the United States turned into a nightmare for more than 100 Venezuelans. Within hours of landing in Caracas, the deportees found themselves trapped under the rubble of a hotel after two powerful earthquakes rocked Venezuela. While many managed to escape with their lives, the country is mourning a massive tragedy, with the official death toll crossing 1,700.
A flight from Miami carrying 146 Venezuelans deported landed in Caracas on Wednesday, according to ICE Flight Monitor, an initiative of Human Rights First that tracks deportation flights. There were 19 women and seven children among the passengers. The group was taken to the hotel, a government-arranged hotel where they were supposed to spend the night before departing to their hometowns.
Twin earthquakes turn hotel into death trapThe deportees were lodged at Hotel Santuario La Llanada when two devastating quakes, measuring 7.2 and 7.5, shook Venezuela.
One of the survivors, 58-year-old Lisbeth Portillo, said she was able to crawl out from under the debris before she joined about 20 other deportees frantically looking for help. “We walked about five kilometers, and I cried and cried … there was no communication,” Portillo said in a phone interview with The Associated Press (AP) from her home in Maracaibo. She described “horrifying scenes” outside the collapsed hotel, with frightened people running through the streets, some barefoot and others without clothes, after escaping the rubble.
The survivors made it to a National Guard building, where they were eventually able to call their families. “I was born again, God gave me a second chance,” said Portillo. "I am traumatised," she said, weeping after a pause, The AP reported. The Venezuelan government says more than 1,700 people died in the earthquakes.
They were deported from the US and arrived hours earlierPortillo was one of those who was deported as part of the Trump administration’s ongoing immigration crackdown. Data from ICE Flight Monitor showed the United States conducted 288 deportation flights to 38 countries in May, including Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Cameroon, Chile and Ivory Coast. In the month, Venezuela alone received 12 deportation flights, with operations being carried out three days each week. The deportation flights to Venezuela resumed in February 2025 after being suspended for 13 months.
'The whole room started collapsing'The deportees, who recounted the terrifying moments before the collapse, said they first received medical examinations and identification documents after arriving in Venezuela. They were then taken to the hotel and advised that they would leave for home the next day.
She was on the second floor of a room with 16 other women. Just prior to the earthquake she had gone out onto the balcony overlooking the sea. She saw that the sky was darker than usual and it was very hot and then went back inside. A moment later she felt the building start to shake violently. "'I started hearing papa, papa papapa,' and I saw the women next to me started falling. They were all calling for help,” she said.
Before anybody had time to react a second and even stronger earthquake hit. “I fell and I ended up buried and covered by a beam, but the shaking moved everything where I was buried and I was able to get out,” said Portillo, who had bruises all over her body. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not immediately respond to a request from The Associated Press for details about the incident.
Another survivor: 'I begged for help'The Venezuelan government released a video on social media showing officials welcoming the deportees at Caracas airport before they were taken to the hotel. Another passenger on the same deportation flight, 24-year-old Jenny Rodriguez, told Telemundo that she survived because another deportee saw her trapped under the rubble.
"I was trapped in the rubble. A fellow passenger on the same flight came over, I freed my hand from the wreckage, grabbed him by the trousers and begged him for help. I was able to get out of there, thanks be to God—and to him," she said.Families still searching for deportees missing
The nightmare is far from over for several families. Liliana Rojas, who told Telemundo she’s still searching for her 33-year-old partner, was deported from the U.S. the same day. Officials at the detention centre in El Paso, Texas, told her only that he had been deported, Rojas said. Since then, she has received no information on whether he survived the earthquake. “Nobody is giving an answer about anything,” Rojas said.
Emotional call from beneath the rubblePortillo had crossed the US-Mexico border in November 2021 and said she had an asylum claim pending before being deported. After the earthquake she was unable to remember the phone numbers of her children but was able to contact her husband who is still in the United States.
I said to him, Cesar, I'm alive. 'Help me.' And my husband kept saying, It can't be,' she said. "I'm alive, I got out of the rubble, I'm alive," I told him. Her husband immediately called their children, who came to meet her the next night. Looking back on the ordeal, Portillo, who has been a South Florida resident for more than four years, summed up her survival in one emotional sentence. That was the day I was born, on the 24th I was born again.
What we know so farThe Venezuelan government says the quakes have killed more than 1,700 people and rescue teams are still combing the affected areas for survivors. Meanwhile, emergency operations continue for a number of deportees who arrived on the same flight and whose fate remains unknown, as anxious families continue to seek answers.