2 girls pulled alive from quake debris
IZMIR, Turkey — When firefighter Muammer Celik reached a 3yearold girl trapped for three days under the rubble of a deadly earthquake in a Turkish coastal city, his heart sank. Elif Perincek was lying motionless, covered in dust, and he asked a colleague for a body bag.
But as Celik extended his arm to wipe her face, the child opened her eyes and grabbed hold of his thumb.
“That’s where we saw a miracle,” Celik of the Istanbul fire department’s searchandrescue team told the Associated Press, recounting Monday’s operation 65 hours after the quake hit Friday, killing at least 94 people in Turkey and Greece.
It was the second dramatic rescue Monday after 14yearold Idil Sirin was also pulled out alive. Onlookers applauded with joy and wept with relief at both scenes in the Turkish city of Izmir, where the vast majority of the deaths and nearly 1,000 injuries have occurred. Two teenagers also died and 19 people were injured on the Greek island of Samos, near the quake’s epicenter in the Aegean Sea.
The U. S. Geological Survey rated the quake 7.0, though other agencies recorded it as less severe. Many buildings were completely reduced to rubble or saw several floors pancake in on themselves. On Monday, authorities detained nine people for questioning about six building collapses, the staterun Anadolu Agency reported.
Celik said he found Perincek lying on her back between her bed and a closet in a space that was just big enough for her.
“At first I was very upset,” he said. “Then I stretched out my hand to clean her face and she grabbed my thumb. … I froze because right before that moment, I had asked my team for a blanket and a body bag.”
His voice breaking with emotion, he added: “This is a firefighter’s joy.”
The child spent nearly three full days in the wreckage of her apartment and became the 106th person to be pulled alive from the rubble. Her mother and 10yearold twin sisters were rescued two days earlier. Her 6yearold brother did not survive.