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Turkey earthquake: death toll rises as search for survivors continues Turkey earthquake: death toll rises as search for survivors continues
(about 4 hours later)
Officials say 21 people killed and 1,030 injured with fatalities likely to increase further At least 22 people killed and more than 1,100 injured, with fatalities likely to increase
The death toll from a powerful earthquake that hit eastern Turkey has risen to 21 people, with more than 1,000 injured, say emergency officials. A powerful 6.8-magnitude earthquake in eastern Turkey has killed at least 22 people, with the death toll expected to rise as rescuers search for survivors under the rubble in freezing winter conditions.
Rescue workers were continuing to search for 30 people buried under the rubble of collapsed buildings in Elâzığ province and neighbouring Malatya, said the health minister, Fahrettin Koca. He warned that the death toll could rise further. The quake late on Friday injured a further 1,103 people in hardest-hit Elazig and Malatya provinces and was followed by more than 390 aftershocks, 14 of which had magnitudes above 4 and were felt as far away as Iran and Lebanon.
TV footage showed rescuers pulling out two injured people from the rubble of a collapsed building in Elâzığ province. At least three people were believed to be trapped in a building in the area, where officials said four or five structures had toppled, including one at least four storeys high. Rescue teams used their hands, drills and mechanical diggers through the night, managing to pull 39 people from the rubble alive as the temperature dropped to -8C (17.6F). At least 22 more people are trapped under collapsed buildings, Turkey’s disaster and emergency authority (Afad) said on Saturday, and rescue efforts were still under way at three different sites in Elazig.
“It was very scary, furniture fell on top of us. We rushed outside,” Melahat Can, 47, who lives in Elâzığ city, told Agence France-Presse. Hundreds of people waited anxiously behind police barriers for any sign of missing relatives. Among those found alive was a pregnant woman who was rescued 12 hours after the quake hit, although her 12-year-old son later died in hospital.
Seventeen people were killed in Elâzığ and four more in the neighbouring province of Malatya, Turkey’s disaster and emergency management authority (AFAD) said. Some 1,030 people were injured. Tensions remained high as one resident accused the government of lying about the extent of the disaster. “They [the government] claim that only four people are trapped under the rubble. It is not true. I have five relatives in that building,” Suat, 45, told Agence France-Presse. “There are four floors and three flats per floor. If there were five people per flat, do the maths. Why are they lying?”
The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, said on Twitter that all measures were being taken to “ensure that the earthquake that occurred in Elâzığ and was felt in many provinces is overcome with the least amount of loss”. Nearly 2,000 search-and-rescue personnel have been sent to the region and thousands of beds, blankets and tents have been provided, the Turkish presidency said, while state carrier Turkish Airlines put on extra flights to Elazig from Ankara and Istanbul to help transport rescuers. Several thousand people are being housed in local sports gymnasiums and schools.
He said the ministers for the interior, health and the environment had been sent to the afflicted region. “Our houses collapsed … we cannot go inside them,” Sinisi, 32, from Sivrice, the town at the epicentre of the quake, told Reuters. “In our village some people lost their lives. I hope God will help us.
The quake struck at 8.55pm local time at a depth of 6.7km (4.2 miles) near the town of Sivrice, the AFAD said. It was followed by several aftershocks, the strongest with magnitudes 5.4 and 5.1. “Our animals died. Our families gathered around the fire to spend the night, covered with blankets.”
Elâzığ is about 750km (465 miles) east of the capital, Ankara. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan cancelled his schedule in Istanbul to fly to the disaster zone on Saturday, state media said. “I wish God’s mercy to our brothers who lost their lives in the earthquake, and urgent healing for those who were injured,” he said on Twitter after the earthquake struck at about 9pm the night before.
Koca said two people killed in Elâzığ had suffered heart attacks. The US Geological Survey assessed the earthquake’s magnitude as 6.7, slightly lower than Afad’s assessment, adding that it struck near the East Anatolian fault in an area that has suffered no documented large ruptures since an earthquake in 1875.
Thirty buildings collapsed in the two provinces, according to the environment minister, Murat Kurum. People were being moved to student accommodation and a sports centre amid freezing temperatures. David Rothery, professor of planetary geosciences at the Open University, said: “This particular earthquake began at a depth of about only 10km [6.2 miles]. This is so shallow that there was not much rock in the way to absorb the strength of the seismic waves radiating from the source before they reached the surface, hence the ground shaking was stronger than it would have been for a deeper earthquake of the same magnitude.”
Elâzığ’s governor, Çetin Oktay Kaldırım, told the Turkish television station NTV that a fire broke out in a building in Sivrice, near the epicentre, but was quickly brought under control. Turkey, which encompasses several active fault lines, is no stranger to deadly earthquakes. The most devastating in recent history was a 7.4-magnitude quake, which hit the western Marmara region in 1999, leaving more than 17,000 dead.
The interior minister, Süleyman Soylu, was at a meeting on earthquake preparedness when the quake struck. Experts have long warned that the most potentially dangerous is the North Anatolian fault, where the Anatolian and Eurasian plates meet. The fault lies underneath Istanbul, home to 16 million people, which in recent decades has encouraged widespread building without enforcing earthquake-resistant measures.
The Kandilli seismology centre, in Istanbul, said the quake measured 6.5, while the US Geological Survey gave the preliminary magnitude as 6.7, and said the quake had affected not only Turkey but also Syria, Georgia and Armenia. Different earthquake monitoring centres frequently give differing estimates. A 5.8-magnitude earthquake in the Marmara Sea caused panic in Istanbul last September, injuring 34 people and shaking and damaging hundreds of buildings.
Turkey sits on top of two major faultlines and earthquakes occur frequently.
Two strong earthquakes struck north-west Turkey in 1999, killing around 18,000 people. A magnitude 6 earthquake killed 51 people in Elaziğ in 2010.