Race to find survivors: Earthquake death toll tops 7,000

NURDAGI, Turkey – Rescuers rushed Wednesday morning to pull survivors out of the rubble before they succumbed to the cold two days after the quake hit southern Turkey and war-torn northern Syria. The death toll has topped 7,700 and is expected to rise even further.

Significant rescues have taken place over the past two days, including small children escaping from rubble more than 30 hours after Monday’s pre-dawn quake. But there was also widespread desperation and growing anger at the slow pace of rescue efforts in some areas.

“It’s like we woke up in hell,” said Osman Can Taninmis, whose family members were still trapped in Hatay, Turkey’s worst-hit province. “We can’t answer absolutely anything. Help doesn’t come, it can’t come. We can’t get through to anyone at all. Everywhere is destroyed.”

In Syria, residents found a crying newborn baby still tied by the umbilical cord to her dead mother. Relatives told The Associated Press that the baby was the only member of her family to survive the collapse of a building in the small town of Ginderis.

CONNECTED: How to help earthquake victims in Turkey and Syria

Search parties arrived from nearly 30 countries and promises of help. But as the damage spread to several cities and towns – some of them isolated by the ongoing conflict in Syria – the voices crying for help from under the pile of rubble fell silent.

Monday’s 7.8 magnitude quake and powerful aftershocks wreaked havoc that stretched hundreds of kilometers (miles) across southeastern Turkey and neighboring Syria. The tremors destroyed thousands of buildings and caused even more suffering in a region devastated by 12 years of Syrian civil war and a refugee crisis.

Turkey is home to millions of war refugees. The affected area in Syria is divided between government-controlled territory and the country’s last opposition-held enclave, where millions of people rely on humanitarian aid to survive.

Unstable piles of metal and concrete made the search dangerous, and freezing temperatures made it even more urgent as concerns grew over how long the survivors could hold out in the cold. Snow swirled around rescuers in parts of Turkey.

The scale of the suffering and the accompanying rescue effort was staggering.

Adelheid Marchang, senior emergency officer at the World Health Organization, said up to 23 million people could be affected across the entire quake-hit zone, calling it “a crisis on top of several crises.”

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that 13 million of the country’s 85 million people were affected and declared a state of emergency in 10 provinces. Authorities said more than 8,000 people have been pulled from rubble in Turkey and about 380,000 have taken refuge in state-run shelters or hotels.

But authorities have faced criticism from residents of hard-hit Hatay, wedged between Syria and the Mediterranean Sea, who say rescue efforts are lagging behind. Erdogan’s handling of the crisis could greatly influence elections scheduled for May, and his office has already dismissed the criticism as misinformation.

Nurgul Atay told The Associated Press that she heard her mother’s voice under the rubble of a collapsed building in the Turkish city of Antakya, the capital of Hatay province. But rescuers did not have the heavy equipment needed to rescue her.

“If we could only lift the concrete slab, we could get to it,” she said. “My mom is 70 years old, she won’t be able to stand it for long.”

Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said 1,647 people had been killed in Hatay alone, the highest figure of any Turkish province. At least 1,846 people had been rescued there as of Tuesday evening, he said. Hatay airport was closed after an earthquake destroyed the runway, hampering rescue efforts.

Meanwhile, relief efforts in Syria are hampered by the ongoing war and the isolation of the rebel-held region along the border, surrounded by Russian-backed government forces. Syria itself is an international pariah under Western war-related sanctions.

The first responders, known as the White Helmets, have years of experience rescuing people from buildings destroyed by Syrian and Russian airstrikes in the rebel-held enclave, but they say the quake has overwhelmed them.

Munir al-Mostafa, deputy head of the White Helmets, said they could effectively respond to up to 30 locations at once but were now facing calls for help from more than 700 people.

“Teams are present in these places, but the vehicles and equipment available are not enough,” he said, adding that the first 72 hours were critical for any rescue operation.

The United Nations said it was “exploring all avenues” to get supplies to the rebel-held northwest.

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the road leading to the Bab el-Hawa border crossing – the only terminal through which UN aid can enter the rebel-controlled area – was damaged by the earthquake, disrupting supplies.

Dujarric said the UN is preparing a convoy to cross the line of conflict in Syria.

The UN is already delivering aid across the lines of conflict to the rebel-held enclave. But it cannot transport the required amount due to difficulties in organizing convoys with the warring parties, which makes the delivery of aid from Turkey critical.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government has pushed for years to send all humanitarian aid out of Syria, including to the opposition-held enclave. The UN has increased supplies across the lines of conflict, but not enough for the millions in need.

Turkey has a large number of troops in the border area and has tasked the military with assisting with rescue efforts, including setting up tents for survivors and a field hospital in Hatay province.

On Tuesday, a warship docked at the port in Iskenderun Province, where a hospital collapsed, to take people in need of medical care to a nearby town.

A large fire in the port, caused by the overturning of containers during the earthquake, sent thick plumes of black smoke into the sky. The Ministry of Defense said the flames were put out with military aircraft, but footage broadcast live by CNN Turk showed it was still burning.

Vice President Fuat Oktoy said at least 5,894 people were killed in the earthquake in Turkey and another 34,810 were injured.

The death toll in government-controlled areas of Syria has risen to 812, with about 1,400 injured, according to the health ministry. At least 1,020 people were killed and more than 2,300 were injured in the rebel-held northwest, according to the White Helmets.

This region sits on top of major fault lines and is often shaken by earthquakes. Approximately 18,000 people died in the equally powerful earthquakes that hit northwestern Turkey in 1999.

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Alsayed reports from Azmarin, Syria. Frazier reported from Ankara, Turkey. Associated Press contributors David Rising in Bangkok, Zeynep Bilginsoy and Robert Badendik in Istanbul, Bassem Mrow and Karim Chehaieb in Beirut, Kim Tong Hyun in Seoul, South Korea, and Riazat Butt in Islamabad contributed to this report.