Three days after the earthquake, the anguish has a first name: someone who isn't answering. The short answer: there are four official, free channels for finding a person, and all of them work from abroad — line 123, the Prosecutor's Office (122 or 01 8000 919748), the Red Cross WhatsApp service and the Forensic Medicine registry. Here is the step-by-step, in order, so the search is method rather than despair.
About the figures, we'll tell you straight: there is still no single consolidated official tally. The numbers in circulation come from different agencies consolidating at different speeds, gathered by the Colombian press: UNGRD was reporting 239 dead and 287 missing, a later national bulletin spoke of 265 and 496, and Asocapitales counted 241 dead in the capital cities alone — with more than 3,400 injured in every count (El Colombiano, El Tiempo). When the Government publishes the official consolidation, we'll update this page — until then, every figure you read here carries its source and its date. Behind every number there's a family dialling a phone. If yours is one of them, this is what you can do from London, today.
First things first: they are most likely fine
In an emergency like this, the first cause of silence is not the worst one: it's power cuts, downed masts and saturated networks in Valle, Risaralda, Chocó and Caldas. Before activating official channels, exhaust the simple things:
- Ask in the family group and the neighbours — a WhatsApp message can get through where a call can't.
- Try at different times: downed networks come back in patches.
- Check for «online» or the double tick: sometimes the person is fine but has no credit or battery to call the UK.
- Ask a relative in another Colombian city to call: national calls get through better than international ones.
Who do I call first? The order the authorities recommend
If the simple things get you nowhere, this is the official circuit (Radio Nacional de Colombia):
- 1. Line 123 (National Police / emergencies): your family in Colombia can report the disappearance and get guidance from there.
- 2. Prosecutor's Office (Fiscalía) — line 122 or 01 8000 919748 (free in Colombia): this is who formalises a missing-person report and loads it into Sirdec, the national registry that cross-checks with hospitals and Forensic Medicine. This is the report that officially counts.
- 3. Colombian Red Cross — Restoring Family Links: designed precisely for those searching from afar. Write to WhatsApp +57 321 213 9525 or email [email protected] with full name, age, last known location and a recent photo (El Tiempo). It works from any country, in your language.
- 4. The municipal ombudsman (personería) of the town or city: in the small municipalities of Chocó and the coffee belt, it's the nearest door.
Have ready before calling: full name and ID number (if you know it), age, address or last known location, who they were with, and a recent photo. Every detail shortens the search.
And colombiatebusca.com? Useful — but no substitute for the official report
colombiatebusca.com has already gathered thousands of citizen reports and helped real reunions (Vanguardia). You can file a report from the UK in two minutes and share the search on WhatsApp. But we repeat what we said on day one, because it matters: it is a citizen initiative, not an official channel — it complements, not replaces, the report to the Prosecutor's Office or the Police (Pulzo). Do both: the official one so they search, the citizen one so more people see it. In Pereira there is also encontrados.co.
Hospitals and shelters: where to look if someone was injured
The injured are concentrated in the hospital networks of Valle del Cauca, Risaralda and Caldas, and evacuees in municipal shelters. The practical route from abroad: the line 123 report and the Red Cross service also track hospitals and shelters — that's their job, you don't need to call hospital by hospital. If you still want to try, ask a relative there to go to the personería or the town hall, which centralise each shelter's lists.
The worst case, said with respect
Not everyone who waits gets good news, and this part needs telling clearly too. Forensic Medicine (Medicina Legal) is the body that identifies victims: as of 13 August it had received 250 bodies, identified 227 and returned 189 to their families (Pulzo), and it publishes official lists of identified people (El Tiempo). The Prosecutor's Office set up two points in Valle del Cauca for the dignified return of victims to their families (Infobae). If you have to live this from here, the official report to the Fiscalía (step 2) is what connects your family to that process — and the consulate can guide you through urgent travel or paperwork: find its details on our Colombian community page. As of today, the consulate in London has published no figures and no official statement on the earthquake — when it does, this guide will carry it.
And something the diaspora knows how to do well: do not forward unofficial lists of the dead that circulate on WhatsApp. They have caused needless pain in every tragedy. Only Forensic Medicine identifies, and only its lists count.
While you wait: what is in your hands
Waiting from afar is its own hard way of living this. What helps: take turns making calls with other relatives so nobody burns out, set two moments a day to try contact instead of dialling non-stop, and lean on your people here — the community's usual places are there for exactly this; this week more than ever. And if in the meantime you want to push from here, the verified ways to donate are still the ones in our day-one guide — and here is the full guide to sending money to your family so it arrives as whole as possible.
Fuerza, parceros. May the list of names you're waiting on keep filling up with «we're okay».
Figures as of 13 August 2026; the channels in this guide are checked daily for as long as the emergency lasts. If a channel stops working or changes, tell us and we'll fix it.