Rescuers were scouring debris on Feb. 10 nearly 100 hours after a massive earthquake hit Türkiye, killing at least 18,342 people in one of the region’s worst disasters for a century.
Bitter cold hampered search efforts in both countries, but more than 80 hours after the disaster struck, 16-year-old Melda Adtas was found alive in the southern Turkish city of Antakya.
Her overjoyed father was in tears and the grieving nation cheered an agonisingly rare piece of good news.
“My dear, my dear!” he called out as rescuers pulled the teen out of the rubble and the watching crowd broke into applause.
The 7.7-magnitude quake struck early Monday as people slept, in a region where many had already suffered loss and displacement due to Syria’s civil war.
Top aid officials were planning to visit affected areas with World Health Organization head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and U.N. humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths both announcing trips.
The president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Mirjana Spoljaric, said she had arrived in Aleppo.
“Communities struggling after years of fierce fighting are now crippled by the earthquake,” Spoljaric tweeted on Wednesday.
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Temperatures in the Turkish city of Gaziantep, located near the epicentre of the quake, plunged to minus three degrees Celsius (26 degrees Fahrenheit) early on Friday.
Despite the cold, thousands of families had to spend the night in cars and makeshift tents – too scared or banned from returning to their homes.
Parents walked the streets of the city carrying their children in blankets because it was warmer than sitting in a tent.
Gyms, mosques, schools and some stores have opened at night. But beds are scarce and thousands spend the nights in cars with engines running to provide heat.
“I fear for anyone who is trapped under the rubble in this,” said Melek Halıcı, who wrapped her two-year-old daughter in a blanket as they watched rescuers working into the night.
Monday’s quake was the largest Türkiye has seen since 1939, when 33,000 people died in the eastern Erzincan province.
Experts fear the number will continue to rise sharply.
In the devastated Turkish town of Nurdağı, close to the epicentre, emergency workers using drones and heat detecting monitors ordered silence when a potential survivor was found.
“The quiet is agonising. We just don’t know what to expect,” Emre, a local resident, said as he waited next to one block on a main road into the town.
Dozens of nations, including China and the United States, have pledged to help.
The World Bank said it would give $1.78 billion in aid to Türkiye to help relief and recovery efforts.
Immediate assistance of $780 million will be offered from two existing projects in Türkiye, said the bank, while an added $1 billion in operations is being prepared to support affected people
