Damascus, Syria.- The 7.8-magnitude quake that struck southeastern Turkey and Syria toppled hundreds of buildings and killed more than 1,300 people, while at least 20 aftershocks have been recorded, the strongest measuring 7.5 magnitude.
Hundreds of people were believed to remain under the rubble, and the death toll could rise as rescuers searched through the wreckage in cities and towns.
On both sides of the border, tremors jolted people awake several hours before dawn and forced them out into the streets on a cold night of wind, rain and snow. Dozens of buildings collapsed in cities across the border region.
Rescuers and residents searched anxiously under the rubble, among the piles of twisted metal and concrete blocks. A hospital has collapsed in Turkey and patients, including newborns, have been evacuated from a handful of centers in Syria.
In the Turkish city of Adana, a witness said three buildings near his home had collapsed. One person exclaimed “I don’t have the strength to hold on” among the rubble as rescuers tried to locate her, said the witness, journalism student Muhammet Fatih Yavus.
“As debris removal efforts continue for many buildings in the earthquake zone, we do not know how high the number of deaths and injuries will rise,” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said.
“We hope to put these disastrous days behind us with unity and solidarity as a country and a nation.”
The quake’s epicenter was north of Gaziantep, a Turkish provincial capital, but it was felt as far as Cairo. He sent Damascus residents fleeing into the streets and gave people a rude awakening in Beirut.
The quake struck a region scarred on both sides of the border by more than a decade of civil war in Syria. On the Syrian side, that area is divided between government-controlled territory and the last opposition-held enclave, which is surrounded by Russian-backed Syrian forces. Turkey, for its part, hosts millions of refugees from that conflict.
Some four million Syrians from other parts of the country displaced by the fighting are crowding the regions controlled by the opposition. Many live in buildings already weakened by past bombings. Hundreds of families were trapped in the rubble, according to a statement from the White Helmets emergency opposition organization.
Battered medical centers and hospitals quickly filled with the wounded, according to rescue workers. Others, such as a maternity hospital, had to be evacuated, according to the SAMS medical organization.
“It is feared that there are hundreds of deaths,” Qaddor said, referring to the northwestern region of the country. “We are under extreme pressure.”
Turkey is located in a zone of large seismic faults and registers frequent earthquakes. Some 18,000 people died in 1999 in a series of earthquakes in the northwest of the country.
The US Geological Survey estimated the quake’s magnitude at 7.8. At least 20 aftershocks have been recorded, the strongest having a magnitude of 7.5, according to Turkish authorities.
