In the port of La Guaira, one of the cities hardest hit by last week's twin earthquakes, the BBC saw people using crowbars, mallets and pickaxes to try to dig out loved ones and neighbours. Tens of thousands of people are still believed to be missing.
Early on Monday, nerves were frayed by a magnitude 4.6 aftershock that again shook La Guaira and the capital Caracas, although no further damage was reported. The quakes struck within 39 seconds of each other on Wednesday, measured at magnitudes 7.2 and 7.5 in the northern state of La Guaira, causing almost 800 buildings to collapse.
“Venezuelans dig with bare hands and basic tools as government aid fails to reach earthquake-hit areas.”
More than 1,700 people have been killed in what Interim President Delcy Rodríguez called the "most brutal natural catastrophe" in Venezuela's history. International aid has mobilised but hopes of finding survivors are fading. Overnight into Monday, a 21-year-old man became the latest person to be pulled alive after being trapped for over 100 hours.
In nearby Catia La Mar, the main search-and-rescue efforts were also still being carried out by local volunteers and international teams, and there was anger at the authorities. The BBC saw signs of the Venezuelan police and army on the streets in the worst-affected areas, but not in the rubble.
Ruben Rojas, a 32-year-old electrician who has been digging in the rubble with only gloves and a hard hat, said: "The civil protection people decided to help, but they don't have the equipment. The government doesn't give it. They are just like us, working with their hands."
In La Guaira city, the deployment of earth-moving equipment was patchy and sporadic, with local people working for days on a single building and the heavy machinery only arriving after it was too late. Carolyn Zerpa, 39, was searching for her father and brother under the rubble by hand. "You can't really do much with just a pickaxe," she told BBC Mundo. Her focus has shifted from rescue to recovery, to find the remains of her family and give them a proper burial.
Zuly Marín, a La Guaira resident of 15 years, said she believed it was impossible to prepare for such a disaster but that the response had been too slow, exacerbated by Venezuela's dire economic situation. "I lost my niece and my brother-in-law. I think that if they [the rescuers and digging equipment] had come sooner, many people could have been saved," she said.