Gorkys Hernandez spent seven seasons in the big leagues chasing fly balls for the Pirates, Giants, Marlins, and Red Sox. This week he was back home in Venezuela, suiting up for a winter-league game, when his whole life changed in 39 seconds.
His wife, Deisy Maria Tovar de Hernandez, was 36 years old. She died when two enormous earthquakes flattened the coastal town of Macuto and the hotel where she was staying. Gorkys had been at the ballpark, just a short distance away, getting ready to play. By the time he reached her, it was too late.
The former outfielder shared the news himself in an emotional Instagram post on Saturday, three days after the disaster. Here is what we know about how it happened, and the scale of what hit Venezuela.
The hotel where the players’ families were staying
Gorkys plays for the La Guaira Delfines (the Dolphins) in the Venezuelan Professional Baseball League. The team was set to face the Aragua Tigres at the Estadio Forum de La Guaira, a beachfront stadium in Macuto. Like a lot of players, Gorkys had his family in town with him.
Deisy and a number of other relatives of Delfines players were staying nearby at the Hotel Eduards. When the ground started shaking, the game was suspended and the players took off running from the stadium straight toward the hotel to find their loved ones. They got there to find large parts of the building had already collapsed, trapping guests under concrete and twisted metal.
Drone footage of the area showed entire stretches of the coast reduced to rubble. The Hotel Eduards became one of the worst symbols of the destruction. One photo captured former Los Angeles Angels prospect Luis Viloria standing in front of the wreckage, just staring at it in silence.
Two earthquakes, 39 seconds apart
What hit Venezuela on June 24 was not one quake but two, back to back. The first measured 7.2 magnitude. Just 39 seconds later, a 7.5 hit. Both started near San Felipe, in the state of Yaracuy, and the shaking tore through La Guaira and Caracas, the capital.
It was the strongest earthquake to strike Venezuela since 1900, which makes it the worst the country has seen in over a century. In La Guaira alone, more than 1,400 buildings came down. The main airport serving Caracas, Simon Bolivar International, was so damaged that every flight was grounded. Researchers studying satellite images estimated that close to 59,000 buildings were damaged or destroyed across the region.
The numbers are hard to take in. As of Saturday, at least 1,430 people were confirmed dead, with more than 3,200 injured. Over 68,900 people were reported missing. One independent database counted more than 11,200 missing in La Guaira state by itself. The United Nations put the damage at somewhere between 4.7 and 8.7 billion dollars, roughly 4 to 8 percent of the entire Venezuelan economy.
The tribute Gorkys wrote for Deisy
For three days, Gorkys did not know for sure what had happened to his wife. He even asked the media and the public to stop spreading unconfirmed information while he waited. Then, on Saturday, he posted a Spanish-language tribute alongside a photo of Deisy.
“Queen of my life, you are and always will be the most beautiful, lovely, precious, the best woman in the world,” he wrote. “In my darkest moments, you always found a way to lift me up.”
He went on: “You will always be with me, every hour and every moment. Fly high, my princess, my queen. May God keep you in His glory, and guide me to keep moving forward and to raise our family.” Anyone who has scrolled his account knows how much he meant it. For years it was full of Christmas pictures and vacation photos of the two of them, captions praising her every time.
They had been married only six months
What makes this even harder to sit with: Gorkys and Deisy had just gotten married. The couple tied the knot in December of 2025, only about six months before she died. They were still newlyweds.
Deisy also had a daughter from a previous relationship, named Vittoria Vasquez. In his tribute, Gorkys made a point of saying he would keep moving forward and continue caring for their family. He is 38 years old, and now he is doing it without the woman he called the queen of his life.
The baseball world got hit hard
Deisy was not the only loss connected to the game. The earthquake reached deep into Venezuelan baseball, which is a huge part of the culture there and a pipeline that has sent dozens of stars to the majors.
Rescue teams were still searching for the wife and daughter of Eliezer Alfonzo, a former major leaguer who now coaches the Delfines. Local sports broadcaster Raul Zambrano shared updates on the search as it dragged on. And there was a gut-punch on the field too. Shortly after Victor Bericoto hit a walk-off home run for the Giants that Wednesday, he learned that his brother Jose’s girlfriend had been killed in the disaster.
The baseball community started circulating phone numbers for blood banks, lists for volunteers, and donation drives almost immediately. When a disaster hits this close to home, players, fans, and families all pull together fast.
People dug through rubble with their bare hands
One of the most painful parts of this story is how the rescue effort played out. With heavy machinery in short supply, ordinary residents of La Guaira started digging through the wreckage with their hands, trying to reach people they could still hear underneath.
A woman named Mileidy Romero, who was searching the rubble in Caraballeda, described what she saw to reporters. “There’s a pile of bodies over there from last night. Newborn babies,” she said. “At 8 p.m. yesterday there were people alive down there, and they haven’t bothered to rescue them. We’ve located several bodies, and they haven’t helped us recover them either. What are they waiting for?”
Days into the search, a message about the Hotel Eduards was still going around online. It read: “As of 4:00 p.m. today, screams can still be heard from the Hotel Eduards. There are people still alive inside. Heavy machinery is required.” A magnitude 4.7 aftershock on June 26 only made things worse, knocking down a bridge that connected Caraballeda to the rest of La Guaira and cutting off relief routes.
Help came in from around the world
About two dozen countries sent aid in the days after the quakes. Two urban search and rescue teams from Miami-Dade, Florida were activated and federalized to help, the first time in over a decade that the State Department deployed such teams beyond its two main national crews. American teams also repaired one of the runways at the damaged Simon Bolivar airport so supplies could land.
The disaster crossed borders in the death toll, too. People from Brazil, China, Spain, and Portugal were among those killed. At least five Spanish nationals died and 119 more were reported missing. Venezuelan forces brought in percussion equipment that can break concrete in a controlled way, still hoping to pull survivors out alive.
Who is Gorkys Hernandez
For American fans who need a refresher, Gorkys Hernandez was a speedy outfielder who reached the majors in 2012 and played through 2019. He suited up for the Pittsburgh Pirates, Miami Marlins, San Francisco Giants, and Boston Red Sox, with his longest stretch (three years) coming in San Francisco.
His best big-league year came in 2018, when he hit .234 with 15 home runs and 40 RBIs across 142 games for the Giants. He finished his MLB run with the Red Sox in 2019, then went home to keep playing in the Venezuelan league, which is where he was when the earthquakes struck.
The death toll was still climbing past 1,400 as crews kept working through the weekend, and the U.S. Geological Survey warned the final number could go much higher. For Gorkys Hernandez, the count is already at one that mattered more than any other. He went to the ballpark a married man. He came back a widower.