Ankara: A massive earthquake in central Turkey and northwest Syria on Monday killed 2,200 people and injured hundreds, demolishing apartment towers and wreaking additional havoc on Syrian areas already ravaged by war.
Cyprus and Lebanon felt the magnitude 7.8 winter quake.
Strong tremors collapsed many buildings, prompting rescue efforts.
“We were rocked.” home had nine people. “I’m waiting for my sons in the rubble.” A woman with a fractured arm and face spoke in an ambulance beside the wreckage of her seven-story Diyarbakir, southeast Turkey, home.
“I’ve never felt anything like it in my 40 years,” said Gaziantep resident Erdem, who declined to disclose his surname.
The chief of the Turkish disaster agency reported 1,014 deaths.
TRT footage showed a building collapse in Adana after the second earthquake. The evacuation was unclear.
The Syrian Health Ministry reported 430 deaths and over 1,000 injuries. A UN spokeswoman reported 255 deaths in rebel-held northwest Syria.
In Diyarbakir, Reuters journalists observed scores of rescue workers combing through a mound of debris, all that was left of a large structure and carting off debris to find survivors.
Men carried a blanketed girl from a collapsing city structure. Rescue personnel lifted stone slabs on a slope of rubble in Izmir.
Twitter footage showed two Aleppo buildings collapse one after the other, filling the street with dust.