The rescue teams that worked throughout the night among the rubble of a collapsed structure in Remedios, Villa Clara, retrieved the lifeless bodies of the last two individuals who remained trapped this morning.
The journalist Henry Omar Pérez, from the Cuban News Agency, confirmed the fatal outcome on his Facebook.
“At 6:50 AM this morning, after intense hours of work, they were able to extract the lifeless bodies of the last two trapped individuals. Rest in peace.”, the communicator wrote on social media.
The current toll is two deceased and one rescued alive.
The survivor was transferred from Remedios to Arnaldo Milián Castro Hospital, located in the municipal seat, according to the cited source.
The collapse and the rescue operation
The collapse occurred this Wednesday at the former Basic Secondary School in the Field (ESBEC) No. 1, known as "La 1", on the way to Rojas, in the municipality of Remedios.
The structure completely collapsed while several people were inside.
Unconfirmed local sources indicated that those present were extracting rebar and other construction materials, a common practice in Cuba due to the chronic shortage of supplies, when the collapse occurred.
Authorities initially estimated that around three people were inside, although unverified reports on social media raised that number to 14.
The trapped individuals were identified as being from Caibarién, a neighboring coastal municipality.
An operation was immediately launched, classified by the authorities themselves as of "high danger and complexity."
The Provincial Fire Command, the Red Cross, and the Integrated Emergency Medical System (SIUM) arrived with heavy machinery—cranes and shovels—to assist with the debris removal, and a generator was set up for nighttime lighting.
Drones, contact with the trapped individuals, and first rescue
Firefighters used drones for precise geolocation of the victims among the rubble, a technique that Cuba began to implement following the explosion at the Saratoga Hotel in 2022.
At 10:11 PM on Wednesday, the rescue teams were maintaining active contact with at least one person trapped and had provided them with water.
Near midnight, the rescuers succeeded in rescuing one of the individuals alive. The search for the others continued relentlessly until dawn on Thursday.
The First Secretary of the Provincial Committee of the Communist Party in Villa Clara, Susely Morfa González, and the municipal authority Milaxy Yanet Sánchez Armás oversaw the operations at the site.
The collapse in Remedios fits into an alarming pattern of collapses occurring throughout Cuba as a result of decades of neglect.
In July, two men became trapped in Colón, Matanzas, due to an illegal demolition for material extraction.
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