adminAleppo. – Heart-rending scenes of a newborn plucked alive from the rubble and a broken father clutching his dead daughter’s hand have laid bare the human cost of violent earthquakes in Syria and Türkiye that by yesterday had climbed above 11 500.
For two days and nights since the 7.8 magnitude quake an impromptu army of rescuers have worked in freezing temperatures to find those still entombed among ruins that pockmark several cities either side of the border.
The death toll from both countries was expected to rise as hundreds of collapsed buildings in many cities have become tombs for people who had been asleep in the homes when the quake hit in the early morning.
The reported death toll rose to 9 057 in Türkiye oyesterday. In Syria, the confirmed toll climbed to more than 2 500 overnight, according to the government and a rescue service operating in the rebel-held northwest.
In the Turkish city of Antakya, dozens of bodies, some covered in blankets and sheets and others in body bags, were lined up on the ground outside a hospital.
Turkish authorities releaseACd video of rescued survivors, including a young girl in pyjamas, and an older man covered in dust, an unlit cigarette clamped between his fingers as he was pulled from the debris.
The World Health Organisation chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned that time is running out for the thousands injured and those still feared trapped.
For Mesut Hancer – a resident of Turkish city Kahramanmaras, near the epicentre – it is already too late.
He sat on the freezing rubble, too grief-stricken to speak, refusing to let go of his 15-year-old daughter Irmak’s hand as her body lay lifeless among the slabs of concrete and strands of twisted rebar.
Even for survivors, the future seems bleak.
Many have taken refuge from relentless aftershocks, cold rain and snow in mosques, schools and even bus shelters – burning debris to stay alive.
Frustration is growing that help has been slow to arrive.
“For two days we haven’t seen the state around here… Children are freezing from the cold,” he said.
In nearby Gaziantep, shops are closed, there is no heat because gas lines have been cut to avoid explosions, and finding petrol is tough.
Across the border in northern Syria, a decade of civil war had already destroyed hospitals, collapsed the economy and prompted electricity, fuel and water shortages.
In the rebel-controlled town of Jindayris, even the joy of rescuing a newborn baby was tainted with sadness.
She was still tethered to her mother who was killed in the disaster.
“We heard a voice while we were digging,” said Khalil al-Suwadi, a relative.
“We cleared the dust and found the baby with the umbilical cord (intact) so we cut it and my cousin took her to hospital.”
The infant faces a difficult future as the sole survivor among her immediate family. The rest were buried together in a mass grave on Tuesday.
Dozens of nations including the United States, China and the Gulf States have pledged to help. – Reuters/AFP
Bongani Ndlovu
Online Reporter