Severe weather in Turkey has killed nine people, while 11 sailors are still missing in the Black Sea, Turkey's interior minister said on Monday.
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Nine of our citizens have died because of the storms ... and extreme rains," Ali Yerlikaya told a press briefing in the northwestern province of Zonguldak, where four people died. Five other people, including three children, died in floods in the southeastern provinces of Batman and Diyarbakir, he said. The body of one of 12 Turkish sailors missing off the coast of Eregli, a port in Zonguldak province, was found on Monday morning, he said.
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Waves of more than eight metres
The Turkish-flagged Kafkametler ship sank after hitting a breakwater on Sunday morning as it left the port of Eregli, about 200 kilometres east of Istanbul, Yerlikaya said. Search operations, previously made impossible by weather conditions, were launched on Monday, he said. Another Cameroonian-flagged ship broke in two on Sunday in Eregli under the violence of the waves, after its entire crew was able to be evacuated unharmed. Winds of 130 to 140 km/h swept through the area, forming waves of eight to nine meters, according to the interior minister.
