Over 248 hours after massive earthquakes hit Turkey, the authorities have rescued a 17-year-old girl from the rubble of a building that collapsed in the southern central province of Kahramanmaras, reported Reuters citing state broadcaster TRT Haber. Rescuers are continuing to extricate people even 10 days after the earthquake which has caused massive destruction and loss of lives in the country.
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According to Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD), the death toll in Turkey has risen to 36,187, reported Reuters. It added that more than 4,300 aftershocks have hit the disaster zone since the initial tremor.
On February 6, the first major earthquake hit central Turkey and northwest Syria with a 7.8 magnitude on the Richter scale. Turkey saw two more earthquakes of 7.6 and 6.0 magnitudes later in the day. On February 13, another earthquake of magnitude 4.7 struck Turkey’s southern city of Kahramanmaras, according to the United States Geological Survey (USGS).
The World Health Organization on Tuesday said that the massive earthquake is the “worst natural disaster” in 100 years in its Europe region. “We are witnessing the worst natural disaster in the WHO European region for a century and we are still learning about its magnitude,” Hans Kluge, WHO regional director for Europe, told a press conference.
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Meanwhile, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan called the quakes “as big as atomic bombs”. He also said that hundreds of thousands of buildings were uninhabitable across southern Turkey, adding “any country would face issues we did during such a disaster”, reported Reuters.
(With inputs from Reuters)