One month after a powerful 7.4-magnitude earthquake shook Colombia on August 10, 23-year-old Ana María Saavedra is still grappling with an almost unbearable loss. She was one of a set of triplets, and the earthquake killed both her parents and her two sisters, leaving her as the sole survivor of her immediate family.
Ana María was living in an apartment building in Cali, a city in southwestern Colombia, when the quake struck. Rescuers worked for days to pull victims from the rubble, and her last surviving sister, Isabela, was eventually found dead. Ana María herself was injured when part of the concrete structure collapsed on her, crushing her pelvis and requiring surgery.
She has largely stayed out of the public eye, asking, through relatives, that the media respect her family’s privacy as she focuses on healing. According to people close to her, doctors expect that with consistent physical therapy, she could be walking normally again within four to five weeks. For now, she moves between a wheelchair and crutches, tiring quickly during rehabilitation sessions.
Beyond the physical recovery, Ana María is also confronting profound grief, now living with extended family members and processing the sudden absence of the parents and sisters she lost. Friends say she has found a sense of purpose in surviving, describing her as one of the earthquake’s true miracles. She has not yet returned to work.
To read the full story, visit El Tiempo’s original report.
Source: Ana María Saavedra, la única trilliza viva de una familia tras el terremoto: así ha sido su vida (eltiempo.com). English version produced with AI assistance.
Image: DFID – UK Department for International Development, BY 2.0 (via Openverse).