‘Only God kept me alive for 36 hours under building’s rubble’ Rongai survivor

An aerial view of the Ongata Rongai collapsed building where 21 year old George Omondi was rescued by disaster management unit and the Kenya Red Cross on Monday afternoon after the building in Ongata Rongai collapsed on Sunday at 2am in the night talks to the press at the Nairobi women’s hospital in Ongata Rongai. PHOTO DAVID GICHURU

NAIROBI: George Omondi went to bed last Saturday night looking forward to a Sunday morning sunshine. Instead, he woke up engulfed in darkness and buried in the rubble of the building he worked as casual labourer frantically gasping for air.

Yet fortune has conspired to give Omondi a rare gift- a second chance to live. When the building under construction collapsed in Ongata Rongai, Nairobi.

The lifeless body of a watchman guarding the six storied house, was pulled out of the rubble at day break. But the whereabouts of Omondi, sleeping on the second floor of the building remained unknown to anxious friends and relatives.

But Omondi, was ‘safely’ buried in the concrete debris, hanging on to life by a whisker. The 21-year-old was eventually pulled out dusty and exhausted after a 36 hours.

“It is only God who kept me alive. I kept praying after I found myself in total darkness. The incident happened while I was dead asleep,” Omondi told journalists yesterday from his hospital bed at Nairobi Women Hospital in Rongai.

The National Youth Service graduate was working as a casual labourer at the site. Miraculously he escaped from the tragedy with only a single scratch to his scalp.

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Rescuers finally found Omondi on Monday lying on his mattress. A rescue team of officers from Kenya Defence Forces, NYS, police and the National Disaster Management Unit said while Omondi lay trapped in the ruins, his only worry was that the rescue team would make the concrete collapse on him.

“I never felt hungry. Not even thirsty. I was lucky I had slept near a column at the corner on the second floor. When the building collapsed, the pillar formed a roof over me. The debris of the roof didn’t fall on me,” he said.

He says: “The mosquito net that I had also kept pebbles away. All I had to do was cover my nose with my shirt to avoid inhaling dust.”

 

Omondi’s father, Joseph Ndege, a chief in Homa Bay County watched the dramatic rescue of his second born child in fear. He said he was horrified when he arrived at the site.

“When I saw the building, I lost any hope of finding him alive. I just prayed that my sons’s body be found intact. It was unimaginable to think that he was alive. I am so happy and grateful that God kept him alive,” he said fighting back tears.

Moses Githinji, the doctor who attended to Omondi at the accident site and now looking after him at the hospital described the rescue as “a miracle”.

“Surviving all that time without water and a meal, with concrete blocks from four floors on top of him and he emerges with a single scar on his head goes beyond science. It is a miracle,” Dr Githinji declared.

Omondi could be discharged today.