Turkish rescuers work to find the last survivors of the earthquake

Turkish rescue teams are working around the clock to find the last survivors of the 6.9-magnitude earthquake that hit the coast of Turkey and the Greek islands in the Aegean Sea yesterday and has already caused at least 37 deaths and more than 800 injuries.

According to the Turkish Minister of the Environment and Urban Planning, Murat Kurum, a hundred people have been found alive among the rubble of the twenty buildings that collapsed yesterday in Izmir, the third largest city in the country (4.3 million inhabitants) and the one most affected by the earthquake, despite being 70 kilometers north of its epicenter.

Work has been completed on most of the collapsed buildings but continues on eight others: it is believed that there may still be more than a dozen people alive, a government official explained.

Although sources from the City Council cited by Turkish media assure that there could be up to 180 disappeared.

In fact

at noon on Saturday a woman and her four minor children were found under one of the damaged buildings and the rescue method was being evaluated.

According to sources cited by the Habertürk chain

It may be necessary to build a tunnel due to the difficulty of accessing the location where they are located.

It is hopeful that in the early hours of Saturday morning, three more people, including a 16-year-old teenager and an elderly woman, were rescued alive after spending 17 hours under the collapsed buildings.

Some 5,000 personnel from the Agency for Disasters and Emergencies (AFAD) and other Turkish government agencies are working in rescue efforts with the support of 50 dogs trained for the task.

According to Turkish television shows, the debris removal work is accompanied by constant calls for absolute silence every time a sound is heard in case it could come from any of the people who have been trapped.

But the number of fatalities also continues to rise.

The latest update from AFAD indicates that 35 people have died in Turkey, a figure that is in addition to the two adolescents who died on Friday on the Greek island of Samos.

In Turkey alone there are more than 830 injured, of which almost half are still hospitalized and 25 are admitted to intensive care units, reported Health Minister Fahrettin Koca.

A woman was rescued this morning from the rubble after yesterday's earthquake in #izmir.

Search and rescue efforts continue with 4,419 search and rescue personnel, 20 K9 dogs and 475 vehicles from AFAD, JAK, NGOs and municipalities.

pic.twitter.com/rtZx989VzV

- AFAD (@AFADTurkey) October 31, 2020

Thousands of people have spent the night in the open - in their vehicles or in tents set up in the streets and parks - for fear of the nearly 500 aftershocks that have followed the earthquake, some greater than magnitude 5, and the damage that their victims may have suffered. households.

"We are all very nervous," acknowledged a Smyrna neighbor in statements to the EFE agency, which also pointed out that ambulances and medical teams are not only treating the injured but also people suffering from nervous breakdowns.

Food, water and blanket distribution points have been established in the streets to attend to the victims.

"We have mobile units on the ground capable of feeding 56,000 people," Minister Kurum explained at a press appearance.

One of the problems for the residents of Izmir (Turkish name for Izmir), even those whose homes have not been damaged, is that the earthquake caused cuts in the distribution of electricity and gas.

“At the time of the earthquake, electricity for 74,500 subscribers was cut off.

But we have accelerated our work.

Under the coordination of the AFAD teams, the electricity supply has begun to recover.

Now there are still 17,824 homes without electricity and we are working on them, ”said Energy Minister Fatih Dönmez.

The next phase will be to assess which buildings have to be demolished and what kind of reinforcements should be made, since it has not yet been established how many have been left uninhabitable.

The authorities have asked citizens not to return to homes that may be damaged and have promised financial aid for those who have lost their homes or cannot return for their belongings.