5 Family Members Pulled Alive From a Devastating Earthquake Nearly a Week Later

Dramatic rescue operations, 129 hours after the quake, brought the number of people rescued to nine on Saturday, despite waning hopes amid freezing temperatures.

ANTAKYA, Hatay – Rescue teams in Turkey on Saturday dragged to safety a family of five who had survived in their destroyed home for five days after a massive earthquake hit the vast Turkish-Syrian border region. However, the death toll was approaching 25,000.

They first pulled mother and daughter Havva and Fatmagul Aslan out of rubble in the heavily damaged city of Nurdag in Gaziantep province, HaberTurk reports. Later, the teams got to the father, Hasan Aslan, but he insisted that his other daughter, Zeynep, and son Saltik Bughra be rescued first.

Then, when the father was carried out, the rescuers applauded and chanted “God is great!”

The dramatic rescue after 129 hours raised the number of rescued on Saturday to nine people, despite waning hopes amid low temperatures. Among them were a disoriented 16-year-old teenager and a 70-year-old woman.

“What day is it?” Kamil Can Aghas, a teenager who was pulled out of the rubble in Kahramanmaras, turned to his rescuers, according to the NTV channel.

Members of the mixed Turkish-Kyrgyz search party hugged, as did the teen’s cousins, with one shouting, “He’s gone, brother. He dropped out. He is here.”

Rescue efforts have brought a glimmer of joy amid devastating days after Monday’s 7.8 earthquake destroyed thousands of buildings, killing more than 24,000 people, injuring 80,000 more and leaving millions homeless. Another earthquake, almost equal in strength and probably caused by the first one, caused more destruction a few hours later.

Rescuers in the Turkish city of Antakya transported 36-year-old Ergin Guzeloglan to an ambulance after they pulled him from a collapsed building on Saturday.

However, not everything ended so well. Rescuers found a 13-year-old girl among the rubble of a collapsed building in Hatay province early Saturday morning and intubated her. But she died before doctors could amputate the limb and free her from the rubble, Hurriyet newspaper reported.

Even though experts say that trapped people can survive a week or more, the chances of finding new survivors were rapidly diminishing. Rescuers switched to thermal imaging cameras to help identify life in the wreckage, a sign of weakness for all survivors.

As aid continued to flow, a 99-strong Indian Army medical team began treating the wounded at a makeshift field hospital in the southern city of Iskenderun, where the main hospital was destroyed.

One man, Shukru Janbulat, was taken to the hospital in a wheelchair, his left leg was badly injured with deep bruising, bruises and lacerations.

Wincing in pain, he said he was rescued from a collapsed apartment building in the nearby city of Antakya hours after Monday’s earthquake. But after receiving basic first aid, he was released without receiving proper treatment for his injuries.

According to him, the hospitals in Antakya were overwhelmed, and he went to the Indian field hospital in Iskenderun to finally heal his wounds.

“I buried (everyone I lost), then I came here,” Dzhanbulat said, counting his dead relatives: “My daughter died, my brother died, my aunt and her daughter died, and the wife of her son,” who was on 8.5 months of pregnancy.

Temperatures remained below freezing throughout a large region, and many people were homeless. The Turkish government has given away millions of hot meals, as well as tents and blankets, but is still unable to help many in need.

The disaster has exacerbated suffering in a region engulfed by a 12-year Syrian civil war that has displaced millions of people internally and made them dependent on aid. The fighting has forced millions of people to seek refuge in Turkey.

The conflict has isolated many parts of Syria and has complicated efforts to deliver aid. The United Nations said the first earthquake relief convoy arrived from Turkey in northwestern Syria on Friday, a day after the arrival of a pre-disaster aid shipment.

The United Nations Refugee Agency has estimated that 5.3 million people have been left homeless in Syria. Sivanka Dhanapala, the UNHCR representative in Syria, told reporters on Friday that the agency is focusing on providing tents, plastic sheeting, thermal blankets, sleeping mats and winter clothing.

President Bashar al-Assad and his wife visited earthquake victims at a hospital in the coastal city of Latakia, the base of support for the Syrian leader.

Syrian state television reported that Assad and his wife Asma on Saturday morning visited Dudu Nurallah, 60, and her son, Ibrahim Zakaria, 22, who were pulled alive from the rubble of a building in the nearby coastal town of Jableh the night before, aged 5. days after the earthquake.

A day earlier, Assad toured the northern city of Aleppo.

Shaheen reported from Latakia, Syria. Fraser reported from Ankara. Contributions were made by Bassem Mrow from Beirut and Gate Alsayed from Bab al-Hawa, Syria.

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