At least 95 Dead In Syria, Turkey After 7.8 Magnitude Earthquake
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Roshan Amiri
- . February 6, 2023
- . Update: February 6, 2023 2:40 pm
A 7.8-magnitude earthquake hit Turkey and Syria on Monday morning while people were still in their sleep, which killed at least 95 people and injured several others.
The Turkish officials put the initial death count at 53. On the Syrian side of the border, at least 42 people died due to the earthquake, the state media said. The death toll is expected to rise because it caught most people while they were still at home asleep.
The earthquake destroyed buildings, sending tremors that were felt in Cairo, Lebanon and Jordan. Many residents in Turkey came outside on a cold winter night. Television images showed them standing in the snow in their night suits. Rescue workers searched for survivors under the crushed buildings in order to evacuate them to a safer place.
In Syria, many people were buried in the rubble of crushed buildings. At least 11 were killed in Atmeh, a part of the Idlib Governorate, located north of Idlib and east of the border with Turkey. Muheeb Qaddour, a doctor in Atmeh, said, “We fear that the deaths are in the hundred.”
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The President of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said on Twitter, “I convey my best wishes to all our citizens who were affected by the earthquake.” He also revealed that rescue teams were immediately dispatched to the areas affected by the powerful quake.
Suleyman Soylu, the Minister of the Interior of Turkey, urged people not to enter damaged buildings. Hulusi Sahin, the Governor of Malatya, said that 130 buildings were destroyed in Malatya, a city in the Eastern Anatolia region of Turkey.
According to the US Geological Survey, the earthquake struck at 04:17 am local time (0117 GMT) at a depth of about 17.9 kilometres (11 miles). A 6.7-magnitude aftershock rumbled about 15 minutes later.
