Rescuers don’t give up. The living are buried with the dead, they say. Efforts continue throughout the night.
By Athena Papakosta
“Is anyone listening;”.
“Can anyone hear us?”
The words of the exhausted rescuers break the deafening silence. They require it so that they can hear those who have the power to shout through tons of cement that they are still alive.
The land in southeastern Turkey and northern Syria still shaking. The members of the rescue crews dig through the wreckage with their bare hands. They step on bent iron and pieces of concrete, they see toys, clothes, shoes, household utensils… pieces of life now mixed with death. They search all night.
“Can anyone hear us?”
Those residents who escaped form a human chain and try to help. With their hands and with shovels and other household tools they try to remove the rubble and find survivors.
“Can anyone hear us?”
It’s cold. It is raining and in some areas it is snowing. Thousands are dead, thousands are injured, millions are homeless. Life in this corner of the map was extinguished within minutes. The force of nature prevailed, as it always does. A magnitude of 7.8 at 04:17 local time early Monday, and a magnitude of 7.7 less than 12 hours later, wreaked havoc and destruction.
“Where is;” cries a desperately crying woman from Malatea, Turkey in a man’s arms. “Where is;”.
At the same time, in Syria a man carries a girl in his arms.
Behind it leveled is a two-story building. The girl is dead. With the help of a woman, the man places it on the ground. He wraps the lifeless body of the girl with a thick blanket so that it does not get wet. Fear gives way to mourning. All around images of biblical destruction.
The aftershocks continue and deal the finishing blow to what has not yet collapsed. Already thousands of buildings fell like paper towers.
“My whole family was buried here. My sons, my daughter, my son-in-law.” Ali asks for help. He digs alone. In Adana, Imran is wrapped in a beige knitted scarf. She cries and shows the camera that this is where the bedroom used to be.
In the wreckage are her daughter, her son-in-law and her 18-month-old grandson.
They lived on the 12th floor of an apartment building that no longer exists. A few meters away, Osmay just saw his brother’s wife dead. “He came to visit us yesterday. Her body is in the corner. I am still looking for my wife, my brother and my nieces and nephews. God put his hand.”
“Can anyone hear us?”
Rescuers don’t give up. The living are buried with the dead, they say. Efforts continue throughout the night.
But there are areas in Kahramanmaras province where residents report that no rescue team has arrived.
“I haven’t seen one. Alone we cannot do much. We have been waiting since morning. In these ruins are my brother and my mother,” said Gülai.
In war-torn Syria, rescuers and residents are racing against time to find survivors. But there are apartment buildings from which no one got out alive.
They became temporary concrete tombs after their foundations had rotted from repeated airstrikes and became structurally vulnerable to Richter.
“I was reborn thanks to God” says Osama who was spared. By his side, his entire family is alive thanks to a wooden door that, he says, saved their lives.
Lives in the wreckage are waiting to be saved while others are waiting to be buried, again.
Will anyone listen to them?
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With a wealth of experience honed over 4+ years in journalism, I bring a seasoned voice to the world of news. Currently, I work as a freelance writer and editor, always seeking new opportunities to tell compelling stories in the field of world news.
