WORSE DAYS AHEAD AS QUAKE TOLL SET TO RISE
4300 dead but many people still trapped in rubble
RESCUE crews battled to reach survivors in Turkey and Syria after dual earthquakes reduced entire neighbourhoods to rubble, and led to fears of worse days ahead.
The death toll had already exceeded 4300 late on Tuesday – but officials warned it would go dramatically higher once collapsed apartment buildings were searched.
An intital pre-dawn 7.8 quake meant people were asleep in their beds when the shaking started. Humanitarian efforts are being hampered by a second 7.5 quake, aftershocks, and the scale of destruction which has left buildings partially collapsed.
The rescue effort is also being threatened by rain and freezing conditions, with people digging for survivors with their bare hands.
UNICEF said thousands of children and families were at risk in the aftermath.
“The images we’re seeing out of Syria and Türkiye are heart-wrenching,” UNICEF executive director Catherine Russell.
“Our immediate priority is to ensure children and families affected receive the support they so desperately need.” The situation in Syria, where hostilities led to mass displacement and devastated public infrastructure, was already dire and is now even worse.
UNICEF said waterborne diseases posed an additional deadly threat to children and families.
Millions of people in Turkey, Syria, Lebanon and Israel felt the earth shake, with tremors felt as far away as Greenland.
The World Heath Organisation estimated as many as 20,000 could have been killed.
“There’s continued potential of further collapses to happen so we do often see in the order of eight fold increases on the initial numbers,” said the WHO’s senior emergency officer for Europe, Catherine Smallwood.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese extended the nation’s “deepest sympathies and condolences” to those affected.
“These multiple earthquakes that hit the region are having a devastating impact, and today I can announce the Australian government will provide an initial $10m in humanitarian assistance to those affected through our Red Cross partners and through humanitarian agencies,” Mr Albanese said.
The aid would “target those in greatest need”, he said.
“I think all of the world’s thoughts and condolences are with the people in this region who are suffering at this time.”
US President Joe Biden promised his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan the US would send “any and all” aid needed to help recover from a devastating earthquake.
“He reaffirmed the readiness of the United States to provide any and all needed assistance to our NATO ally Turkey in response to this tragedy,” the White House said in a statement.
“He noted that
US teams are deploying quickly to support Turkish search and rescue efforts and co-ordinate other assistance.”
Multi-storey apartment buildings full of residents were among the 5606 structures destroyed in Turkey, while Syria announced dozens of collapses, as well as damage to archaeological sites in Aleppo.
“That was the first time we have ever experienced anything like that,” said Melisa Salman, a 23-yearold reporter in the southeastern Turkish city of Kahramanmaras. “We thought it was the apocalypse.”
Whole families are feared to have been lost.
“Seven members of my family are under the debris,” Muhittin Orakci, a stunned survivor in Turkey’s mostly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir, said. “My sister and her three children are there. And also her husband, her father-in-law and her mother-in-law.”
Officials said the quake made three major airports in the area inoperable, further complicating deliveries of aid.
The initial quake was followed by more than 50 aftershocks, including one
measuring 7.5 magnitude.
“We hear voices here – and over there, too,” one rescuer told NTV in front of a flattened building Diyarbakir.
“There may be 200 people under the rubble.”
In the southeastern Turkish city of Sanliurfa, rescuers were working into the night to try to pull survivors from rubble.
“There is a family I know under the rubble,” said Omer El Cuneyd, 20.
“Until 11am or noon, my friend was still answering the phone. But she no longer answers. She is down there.”
Despite temperatures falling below zero, frightened residents in the city spent the night on the streets, huddling around fires for warmth.
Mustafa Koyuncu was sitting packed inside his car with his wife and their five children, too scared to move.
“We are waiting here because we can’t go home,” the 55-year-old said. “Everyone is afraid.”
In Syria, pro-government media said several buildings had partially collapsed in Hama, central Syria.
The head of Syria’s National Earthquake Centre, Raed Ahmed, told pro-government radio that this was “the biggest earthquake recorded in the history of the centre”.
Osama Abdel Hamid said his family was sleeping the when shaking began.
“I woke up my wife and my children and we ran towards the door,” he said. “We opened it and suddenly all the building collapsed.”
A spokesman for Syria’s civil defence said teams were scrambling to rescue trapped people.
“Many buildings in different cities and villages in northwestern Syria collapsed … Even now, many families are under the rubble,” said Ismail Alabdallah.