Earthquakes in Turkey and Syria. 7.8 magnitude.

mickeyrat

ap is saying over 17k and counting...

tempo_n_groove

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/2/8/how-to-donate-to-turkey-and-syria-earthquake-disaster-response

If you want to donate to help.

brianlux

tempo_n_groove said:

Over 16,000 dead now...

Holy cow...

mickeyrat said:

ap is saying over 17k and counting...

Every time I check the news the numbers go up.   The Guardian is now say the total between Turkey ans Syria has surpassed 20,000.  That's hard to comprehend. 

Also difficult to imagine is that this is now where near a record number of earthquake related deaths.  The 2004 Indian Ocean Earthquake cause nearly 228,000 fatalities.

23scidoo

https://www.bbc.com/news/64568826

brianlux

23scidoo said:

https://www.bbc.com/news/64568826

This really stand out in that article:

Although the quakes were powerful, experts say properly constructed buildings should have been able to stay standing.

"The maximum intensity for this earthquake was violent but not necessarily enough to bring well constructed buildings down," says Prof David Alexander, an expert in emergency planning and management at University College London.

"In most places the level of shaking was less than the maximum, so we can conclude out of the thousands of buildings that collapsed, almost all of them don't stand up to any reasonably expected earthquake construction code."

So many lives lost because of one word: cheap.

mace1229

brianlux said:

tempo_n_groove said:

Over 16,000 dead now...

Holy cow...

mickeyrat said:

ap is saying over 17k and counting...

Every time I check the news the numbers go up.   The Guardian is now say the total between Turkey ans Syria has surpassed 20,000.  That's hard to comprehend. 

Also difficult to imagine is that this is now where near a record number of earthquake related deaths.  The 2004 Indian Ocean Earthquake cause nearly 228,000 fatalities.

Almost all of that was the tsunami that followed. And while the earth quake did cause the tsunami, those that died as a direct result of the earth quake was much smaller. What is crazy is how powerful it was, a lot of people people don't understand the richter scale, and that earthquake was about 20 times larger than this one. How much worse could it have been if they were hit with one like that?
The 2010 Haiti earthquake was almost as bad though, and that was just a direct result of the earthquake.

tempo_n_groove

mace1229 said:

brianlux said:

tempo_n_groove said:

Over 16,000 dead now...

Holy cow...

mickeyrat said:

ap is saying over 17k and counting...

Every time I check the news the numbers go up.   The Guardian is now say the total between Turkey ans Syria has surpassed 20,000.  That's hard to comprehend. 

Also difficult to imagine is that this is now where near a record number of earthquake related deaths.  The 2004 Indian Ocean Earthquake cause nearly 228,000 fatalities.

Almost all of that was the tsunami that followed. And while the earth quake did cause the tsunami, those that died as a direct result of the earth quake was much smaller. What is crazy is how powerful it was, a lot of people people don't understand the richter scale, and that earthquake was about 20 times larger than this one. How much worse could it have been if they were hit with one like that?
The 2010 Haiti earthquake was almost as bad though, and that was just a direct result of the earthquake.

That was a 9.1.  That is a huge earthquake.  I don't think the US has had one since that in Alaska?

If it ever reaches a 10 the ground liquifies and will swallow everything up around it.  Catastrophic is an understatement.

tempo_n_groove

brianlux said:

23scidoo said:

https://www.bbc.com/news/64568826

This really stand out in that article:

Although the quakes were powerful, experts say properly constructed buildings should have been able to stay standing.

"The maximum intensity for this earthquake was violent but not necessarily enough to bring well constructed buildings down," says Prof David Alexander, an expert in emergency planning and management at University College London.

"In most places the level of shaking was less than the maximum, so we can conclude out of the thousands of buildings that collapsed, almost all of them don't stand up to any reasonably expected earthquake construction code."

So many lives lost because of one word: cheap.

I mentioned this earlier, I worked over in the Middle East and saw how they construct buildings.  They have a building style that didn't fair well in bombs and now in earthquakes.

Cheap is a good word for it.  lazy perhaps too.  Regulations are very easy to overlook there still.

Well hell, isn't there a building in San Fran that cheaped out and didn't put their foundation to bedrock and it has a lean?

Next earthquake that one is going over unfortunately.

brianlux

mace1229 said:

brianlux said:

tempo_n_groove said:

Over 16,000 dead now...

Holy cow...

mickeyrat said:

ap is saying over 17k and counting...

Every time I check the news the numbers go up.   The Guardian is now say the total between Turkey ans Syria has surpassed 20,000.  That's hard to comprehend. 

Also difficult to imagine is that this is now where near a record number of earthquake related deaths.  The 2004 Indian Ocean Earthquake cause nearly 228,000 fatalities.

Almost all of that was the tsunami that followed. And while the earth quake did cause the tsunami, those that died as a direct result of the earth quake was much smaller. What is crazy is how powerful it was, a lot of people people don't understand the richter scale, and that earthquake was about 20 times larger than this one. How much worse could it have been if they were hit with one like that?
The 2010 Haiti earthquake was almost as bad though, and that was just a direct result of the earthquake.

Yeah, I forgot about that.  You're right, it was the tsunami that led to so many deaths.  That was tragic.

tempo_n_groove said:

brianlux said:

23scidoo said:

https://www.bbc.com/news/64568826

This really stand out in that article:

Although the quakes were powerful, experts say properly constructed buildings should have been able to stay standing.

"The maximum intensity for this earthquake was violent but not necessarily enough to bring well constructed buildings down," says Prof David Alexander, an expert in emergency planning and management at University College London.

"In most places the level of shaking was less than the maximum, so we can conclude out of the thousands of buildings that collapsed, almost all of them don't stand up to any reasonably expected earthquake construction code."

So many lives lost because of one word: cheap.

I mentioned this earlier, I worked over in the Middle East and saw how they construct buildings.  They have a building style that didn't fair well in bombs and now in earthquakes.

Cheap is a good word for it.  lazy perhaps too.  Regulations are very easy to overlook there still.

Well hell, isn't there a building in San Fran that cheaped out and didn't put their foundation to bedrock and it has a lean?

Next earthquake that one is going over unfortunately.

Right, lazy as well.

OMG, yeah, The Millennial Tower in San Francisco.  What a nightmare.  At 58 stories, it's the tallest residential building in the city, built on landfill, and not anchored onto bedrock.  What could go wrong?

I think we can add "stupid" to the list with cheap and lazy!

mace1229

tempo_n_groove said:

brianlux said:

23scidoo said:

https://www.bbc.com/news/64568826

This really stand out in that article:

Although the quakes were powerful, experts say properly constructed buildings should have been able to stay standing.

"The maximum intensity for this earthquake was violent but not necessarily enough to bring well constructed buildings down," says Prof David Alexander, an expert in emergency planning and management at University College London.

"In most places the level of shaking was less than the maximum, so we can conclude out of the thousands of buildings that collapsed, almost all of them don't stand up to any reasonably expected earthquake construction code."

So many lives lost because of one word: cheap.

I mentioned this earlier, I worked over in the Middle East and saw how they construct buildings.  They have a building style that didn't fair well in bombs and now in earthquakes.

Cheap is a good word for it.  lazy perhaps too.  Regulations are very easy to overlook there still.

Well hell, isn't there a building in San Fran that cheaped out and didn't put their foundation to bedrock and it has a lean?

Next earthquake that one is going over unfortunately.

I saw a building like that in Pisa. It was crazy.

tempo_n_groove

mace1229 said:

tempo_n_groove said:

brianlux said:

23scidoo said:

https://www.bbc.com/news/64568826

This really stand out in that article:

Although the quakes were powerful, experts say properly constructed buildings should have been able to stay standing.

"The maximum intensity for this earthquake was violent but not necessarily enough to bring well constructed buildings down," says Prof David Alexander, an expert in emergency planning and management at University College London.

"In most places the level of shaking was less than the maximum, so we can conclude out of the thousands of buildings that collapsed, almost all of them don't stand up to any reasonably expected earthquake construction code."

So many lives lost because of one word: cheap.

I mentioned this earlier, I worked over in the Middle East and saw how they construct buildings.  They have a building style that didn't fair well in bombs and now in earthquakes.

Cheap is a good word for it.  lazy perhaps too.  Regulations are very easy to overlook there still.

Well hell, isn't there a building in San Fran that cheaped out and didn't put their foundation to bedrock and it has a lean?

Next earthquake that one is going over unfortunately.

I saw a building like that in Pisa. It was crazy.

Yeah, that one is crazy and only a fraction of the size of that tower in SF.  Look it up.  I can't believe they allow that thing to stand and be occupied.

brianlux

tempo_n_groove said:

mace1229 said:

tempo_n_groove said:

brianlux said:

23scidoo said:

https://www.bbc.com/news/64568826

This really stand out in that article:

Although the quakes were powerful, experts say properly constructed buildings should have been able to stay standing.

"The maximum intensity for this earthquake was violent but not necessarily enough to bring well constructed buildings down," says Prof David Alexander, an expert in emergency planning and management at University College London.

"In most places the level of shaking was less than the maximum, so we can conclude out of the thousands of buildings that collapsed, almost all of them don't stand up to any reasonably expected earthquake construction code."

So many lives lost because of one word: cheap.

I mentioned this earlier, I worked over in the Middle East and saw how they construct buildings.  They have a building style that didn't fair well in bombs and now in earthquakes.

Cheap is a good word for it.  lazy perhaps too.  Regulations are very easy to overlook there still.

Well hell, isn't there a building in San Fran that cheaped out and didn't put their foundation to bedrock and it has a lean?

Next earthquake that one is going over unfortunately.

I saw a building like that in Pisa. It was crazy.

Yeah, that one is crazy and only a fraction of the size of that tower in SF.  Look it up.  I can't believe they allow that thing to stand and be occupied.

It's unnerving to be in that part of the city any more.  Pretty much any time we head down there, we go to Golden Gate Park or visit friends in much safer Noe Valley.

Another reason to avoid downtown is the somewhat new Salesforce phallus.  Imagine this sucker going down in an earthquake (and notice in the background other high rise buildings going up on landfill):

Halifax2TheMax

Not sure this would make a difference but it seems they tried.

Salesforce Tower is located near San Francisco’s historic coastline, which is prone to soil instability during tremors.

To accommodate for this structural hazard, the building’s construction is designed to resist the region’s biggest earthquakes. Its foundation consists of 42 piles sunk roughly 91 meters to bedrock and a 4.3-meter-thick foundation mat. The 61st floor functions as a viewing platform and communal lounge area for the Salesforce workers and visitors. The corporation offered advanced signup for open visits of the observation deck once a month. Above the 61st story of the skyscraper, it has been described as “mainly decorative.”

mickeyrat

https://apnews.com/article/science-2023-turkey-syria-earthquake-earthquakes-ad5598cbd7913e7a18b8717a04739ff9

  

2023 Turkey-Syria earthquake Earthquakes Syria Turkey

Rescuers rejoice as more quake survivors emerge from rubble

By JUSTIN SPIKE, GHAITH ALSAYED and ZEYNEP BILGINSOY

Today

ISKENDERUN, Turkey (AP) — Six relatives huddled in a small air pocket, day after day. A desperate teenager grew so thirsty that he drank his own urine. Two frightened sisters were comforted by a pop song as they waited for rescuers to free them.

These earthquake survivors were among more than a dozen people pulled out of the rubble alive Friday after spending over four days trapped in frigid darkness following the disaster that struck Turkey and Syria.

The unlikely rescues, coming so long after Monday’s 7.8-magnitude quake brought down thousands of buildings, offered fleeting moments of joy amid a catastrophe that has killed nearly 24,000 people, injured at least 80,000 others and left millions homeless.

In the Mediterranean coastal city of Iskenderun, a crowd chanted “God is great!” as Haci Murat Kilinc and his wife, Raziye, were carried on stretchers to a waiting ambulance.

“You’ve been working so many hours, God bless you!” a relative of the couple told one of their saviors.

One rescue worker said that Kilinc had been joking with crew members while still trapped beneath the rubble, trying to boost their morale.

Two hours earlier in Kahramanmaras, the city closest to the epicenter, rescuers embraced and chanted their thanks to God after pulling a man from his collapsed home.

In Adiyaman, a hard-hit city of more than a quarter-million people, rescuers and onlookers suppressed their joy so as not to frighten 4-year-old Yagiz Komsu as he emerged from the debris, according the HaberTurk television, which broadcast the rescue live.

To distract him, he was given a jelly bean. Teams later rescued his 27-year-old mother, Ayfer Komsu, who had a broken rib.

But the flurry of dramatic rescues could not obscure the devastation spread across a sprawling border region that is home to more than 13.5 million people. Entire neighborhoods of high-rises have been reduced to rubble, and the quake has already killed more people than Japan’s Fukushima earthquake and tsunami, with many more bodies yet to be recovered and counted.

Relatives wept and chanted as rescuers pulled 17-year-old Adnan Muhammed Korkut from a basement in the Turkish city of Gaziantep, near the quake’s epicenter. He had been trapped for 94 hours, forced to drink his own urine to survive.

“Thank God you arrived,” he said, embracing his mother and others who leaned down to kiss and hug him as he was being loaded into an ambulance.

For one of the rescuers, identified only as Yasemin, Adnan’s survival hit home hard.

“I have a son just like you,” she told him after giving him a warm hug. “I swear to you, I have not slept for four days. … I was trying to get you out.”

Elsewhere, HaberTurk television said rescuers had identified nine people trapped inside the remains of a high-rise apartment block in Iskenderun and pulled out six of them, including a woman who waved at onlookers as she was being carried away on a stretcher. The crowd shouted “God is great!” after she was brought out.

The building was only 600 feet (200 meters) from the Mediterranean Sea and narrowly avoided being flooded when the massive earthquake sent water surging into the city center.

Video of another rescue effort in Kahramanmaras showed an emergency worker playing a pop song on his smartphone to distract the two teenage sisters as they waited to be freed.

There were still more stories: A German team said it worked for more than 50 hours to free a woman from a collapsed house in Kirikhan. And a trapped woman could be heard speaking to a team trying to dig her out in video broadcast by HaberTurk television. She told her would-be rescuers that she had given up hope of being found — and prayed to be put to sleep because she was so cold. The station did not say where the operation was taking place.

Even though experts say trapped people can live for a week or more, the odds of finding more survivors were quickly waning.

Death loomed everywhere: Morgues and cemeteries were overwhelmed, and bodies wrapped in blankets, rugs and tarps lay in the streets of some cities.

Temperatures remained below freezing across the large region, and many people have no shelter. The Turkish government has distributed millions of hot meals, as well as tents and blankets, but was still struggling to reach many people in need.

The disaster compounded suffering in a region beset by Syria's 12-year civil war, which has displaced millions of people within the country and left them dependent on aid. The fighting sent millions more to seek refuge in Turkey.

The conflict has isolated many areas of Syria and complicated efforts to get aid in. The United Nations said the first earthquake-related aid convoy crossed from Turkey into northwestern Syria on Friday — a day after an aid shipment planned before the disaster arrived.

The U.N. refugee agency estimated that as many as 5.3 million people have been left homeless in Syria. Sivanka Dhanapala, the country representative in Syria for UNHCR, told reporters Friday that the agency is focusing on providing tents, plastic sheeting, thermal blankets, sleeping mats and winter clothing.

Syrian President Bashar Assad and his wife, Asmaa, visited survivors at the Aleppo University Hospital, according to Syrian state media. It was the leader's first public appearance in an affected area of the country since the disaster. He then visited rescuers in one of the city's hardest-hit areas.

Aleppo has been scarred by years of heavy bombardment and shelling — much of it by the forces of Assad and his ally, Russia — and it was among the cities most devastated by the earthquake.

The Syrian government also announced that it will allow aid to reach all parts of the country, including areas held by insurgent groups in the northwest.

Also Friday, the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, declared a cease-fire in its separatist insurgency in Turkey’s mainly Kurdish southeast, including some areas affected by the quake.

Turkey’s disaster-management agency said more than 20,200 people had been confirmed killed in the disaster so far in Turkey, with more than 80,000 injured.

More than 3,500 have been confirmed killed in Syria, bringing the total number of dead to nearly 24,000.

Some 12,000 buildings in Turkey have either collapsed or sustained serious damage, according to Turkey’s minister of environment and urban planning, Murat Kurum. Turkey's vice president, Fuat Oktay, said more than 1 million people were being housed in temporary shelters.

Engineers suggested that the scale of the devastation was partly explained by lax enforcement of building codes.

___

Alsayed reported from Bab al-Hawa, Syria. Bilginsoy reported from Istanbul. Associated Press journalists Robert Badendieck in Istanbul; Mehmet Guzel in Antakya, Turkey; Emrah Gurel and Yakup Paksoy in Adiyaman, Turkey; Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey; Bassem Mroue and Abby Sewell in Beirut; Salar Salim in Erbil, Iraq; Hogir al-Abdo in Manbij, Syria; and David Rising in Bangkok contributed to this report.

brianlux

Halifax2TheMax said:

Not sure this would make a difference but it seems they tried.

Salesforce Tower is located near San Francisco’s historic coastline, which is prone to soil instability during tremors.

To accommodate for this structural hazard, the building’s construction is designed to resist the region’s biggest earthquakes. Its foundation consists of 42 piles sunk roughly 91 meters to bedrock and a 4.3-meter-thick foundation mat. The 61st floor functions as a viewing platform and communal lounge area for the Salesforce workers and visitors. The corporation offered advanced signup for open visits of the observation deck once a month. Above the 61st story of the skyscraper, it has been described as “mainly decorative.”

To be honest, I wish thee damn thing were actually a rocket and would blast off and keep going.  To my eyes, it ruined the skyline of my favorite city.  But I guess that's "progress".

brianlux

Utterly heartbreaking...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/11/turkey-earthquake-defining-image-adem-altan

mickeyrat

https://www.vox.com/world/2023/2/9/23591279/turkey-earthquake-erdogan-response-elections

 

Will Turkey’s earthquake response threaten President Erdogan’s grip on power?

After the disaster, Erdogan’s decisions — past and present — are under scrutiny.

By Jen Kirbyjen.kirby@vox.com Feb 9, 2023, 1:45pm EST

The earthquake that struck southeastern Turkey this week is now one of the deadliest disasters in decades. More than 20,000 people have been killed in Turkey and Syria, with the toll expected to rise as wintry conditions and time foreclose the chance to pull survivors from the rubble.

In Turkey alone, an estimated 16,000 have been killed. More than 6,400 buildings have collapsed in an area that was prone to earthquakes and whose recent buildings were, if not earthquake-proofed, supposed to be better able to withstand the next big tremor. Which means now, as the emergency unfolds into a sustained tragedy, it looks as if Turkey was unprepared for a disaster that was a matter of when, not if.

In Turkey, this is raising questions about who is responsible — and right now, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) are facing scrutiny from survivors and opposition politicians for potentially making Turkey more vulnerable to the quake, and for the government response in the aftermath.

continues.....

josevolution

Just got back from my trip to Chile a country prone to earthquakes I was 5 when this earthquake hit 
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1965_Valpara%C3%ADso_earthquake_and_the_El_Cobre_dam_failures
and was 1 month away from being born in 1960 when a 9.5 hit Chile I have to ask my father how they survived it, my mother was visiting in 1985 the day after she left to come back to USA the country got hit with a big earthquake! I still remember the streets moving as if they were sitting on water when I was 5 

brianlux

josevolution said:

Just got back from my trip to Chile a country prone to earthquakes I was 5 when this earthquake hit 
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1965_Valpara%C3%ADso_earthquake_and_the_El_Cobre_dam_failures
and was 1 month away from being born in 1960 when a 9.5 hit Chile I have to ask my father how they survived it, my mother was visiting in 1985 the day after she left to come back to USA the country got hit with a big earthquake! I still remember the streets moving as if they were sitting on water when I was 5 

Despite being born in and living in California most of my life, I don't worry much about earthquakes.  But 9.5!  Now that would NOT be something I would want to experience!

Glad you survived those quakes in Chile!  The world is a better place with you in it. 

mickeyrat

https://apnews.com/article/2023-turkey-syria-earthquake-middle-east-earthquakes-c86046a654311d8099d8b7a3dc2b832b

 

Earthquakes 2023 Turkey-Syria earthquake Turkey government Turkey Syria

Survivors still being found as quake death toll tops 28,000

By JUSTIN SPIKE, ABDELRAHMAN SHAHEEN and ZEYNEP BILGINSOY

Today

LATAKIA, Syria (AP) — Ibrahim Zakaria lost track of time drifting into and out of consciousness while trapped for nearly five days in the rubble of his home following the massive earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria this week.

The 23-year-old cellphone shop worker from the Syrian town of Jableh survived on dirty drips of water and eventually lost hope that he’d be saved.

“I said I am dead and it will be impossible for me to live again,” Zakaria, who was rescued Friday night, told The Associated Press on Saturday from his bed at a hospital in the coastal city of Latakia where his 60-year-old mother, Duha Nurallah, was also recovering.

Five days after two powerful earthquakes hours apart caused thousands of buildings to collapse, killing more than 28,000 people and leaving millions homeless, rescuers were still pulling unlikely survivors from the ruins — one of them just 7 months old.

Although each rescue elicited hugs and shouts of “Allahu akbar!” — “God is great!” — from the weary men and women working tirelessly in the freezing temperatures to save lives, they were the exception in a region blanketed by grief, desperation and mounting frustration.

More than a dozen survivors were rescued Saturday, including a family in Kahramanmaras, the Turkish city closest to the epicenter of Monday’s quake. Crews there helped 12-year-old Nehir Naz Narli to safety before going back for her parents.

---

EARTHQUAKES

Live Updates I Focus turns to quake aid, as rescues continue

Rescuers rejoice as more quake survivors emerge from rubble

AP Week in Pictures: Global / Feb. 4-10, 2023

Quake brings chance for Syria's Assad to ease isolation

In Gaziantep province, which borders Syria, a family of five was rescued from a demolished building in the city of Nurdagi, and a man and his 3-year-old daughter were pulled from debris in the town of Islahiye, television network HaberTurk reported. A 7-year-old girl was also rescued in Hatay province.

In Elbistan, a district in Kahramanmaras province, 20-year-old Melisa Ulku and another person were saved from the rubble 132 hours after the quake struck. Before she was brought to safety, police asked onlookers not to cheer or clap so as not to interfere with nearby rescue efforts.

Turkish TV station NTV reported that a 44-year-old man in Iskenderun, in Hatay province, was rescued 138 hours into his ordeal. Crying rescuers called it a miracle, with one saying they weren't expecting to find anyone alive but as they were digging, they saw his eyes and he said his name. In the same province, NTV also reported that a baby boy named Hamza was found alive in Antakya 140 hours after the quake. Some details of his rescue, including how he survived so long, weren't immediately clear.

A five-year-old girl and her younger brother have been receiving treatment on Friday in a Syrian hospital after surviving a catastrophic 7.8-magnitude earthquake in the city of Harem in Syria earlier in the week. (Feb. 11)

Not every attempt ended happily. Zeynep Kahraman, who was brought out of the rubble after a spectacular rescue that took 50 hours, died at a hospital overnight. The ISAR German team who rescued her were shocked and saddened.

“It is important that the family could say goodbye, that they could see each other one more time, that they could hug each other again,” a member of the rescue team told German TV news channel n-tv.

The rescues came amid growing frustration over the Turkish government's response to the earthquake, which has killed 24,617 people and injured at least 80,000 people in Turkey alone.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan acknowledged earlier in the week that the initial response was hampered by the extensive damage to roads and other infrastructure that made it difficult to reach some points. He also said the worst-affected area was 500 kilometers (310 miles) in diameter and was home to 13.5 million people in Turkey.

That has meant rescue crews have had to pick and choose how and where to help.

During a tour of quake-damaged cities Saturday, Erdogan said a disaster of this scope was rare and again referred to it as the “disaster of the century.”

But the challenges facing aid efforts were of little comfort to those waiting for help.

In Antakya, the capital of Hatay province, scattered rescue crews were still hard at work but many residents had left by Saturday. Among those who stayed were people with family still buried. Many of them had been camping in the streets for days and sleeping in cars.

Acting on a tip, a rescue team from Hong Kong found three survivors under a building near the city's center on Saturday, said Gallant Wong, the group's spokesperson.

But Bulent Cifcifli, a local man, said he has been waiting for days for crews to pull his mother's body from her collapsed home. He said rescuers were working to retrieve her body at one point, but they were called to another location because they suspected there were survivors.

“Six days later, we don’t know how many are still under the rubble, and how many are dead or alive,” Cifcifli said, blaming a lack of heavy equipment.

Yazi al-Ali, a Syrian refugee who came to Antakya from Reyhanli, has been living in a tent as she waits for crews to find her mother, two sisters, including one who was pregnant, and their families. At one point, she stood over the rubble of the home in Antakya's old city center where she believes her pregnant sister was buried and, in a cracking voice, shouted her sister's name, “Rajha!”

“No one is answering to us, and no one comes to look,” she said. “They have stopped us from looking ourselves. I don’t know why.”

Even though experts say trapped people can live for a week or more, the odds of finding additional survivors are quickly waning. Rescuers were shifting to thermal cameras to help identify life amid the rubble, a sign that any remaining survivors could be too weak to call for help.

As aid continued to arrive Saturday, a 99-member group from the Indian Army’s medical assistance team began treating the injured in a temporary field hospital in the southern city of Iskenderun, where a main hospital was demolished.

One man, Sukru Canbulat, was wheeled into the hospital, his left leg badly injured with deep bruising, contusions and lacerations.

Wincing in pain, he said he was rescued from his collapsed apartment building in nearby Antakya within hours of the quake. But after receiving basic first aid, he was released without getting proper treatment.

“I buried (everyone that I lost), then I came here,” Canbulat said, counting his dead relatives. “My daughter is dead, my sibling died, my aunt and her daughter died, and the wife of her son” who was 8½ months pregnant.

A large makeshift graveyard was under construction in Antakya's outskirts on Saturday. Backhoes and bulldozers dug pits in the field as trucks and ambulances loaded with black body bags arrived continuously. Soldiers directing traffic on the busy adjacent road warned motorists not to take photos.

The hundreds of graves, spaced no more than 3 feet (a meter) apart, were marked with simple wooden planks set vertically in the ground.

A worker with Turkey’s Ministry of Religious Affairs who didn't wish to be identified because of orders not to share information with the media said that around 800 bodies were brought to the cemetery Friday, its first day of operation. By midday Saturday, he said, as many as 2,000 had been buried.

The disaster compounded suffering in a region beset by Syria’s 12-year civil war, which has displaced millions of people within the country and left them dependent on aid. The fighting sent millions more to seek refuge in Turkey.

The conflict has isolated many areas of Syria and complicated efforts to get aid in. The United Nations said the first earthquake-related aid convoy crossed from Turkey into northwestern Syria on Friday, the day after an aid shipment planned before the disaster arrived. The U.N. refugee agency estimated that as many as 5.3 million people have been left homeless in Syria alone.

The death toll in Syria’s northwestern rebel-held region has reached 2,166, according to the rescue worker group the White Helmets. The overall death toll in Syria stood at 3,553 on Saturday, though the 1,387 deaths reported for government-held parts of the country hadn’t been updated in days.

____

Spike reported from Antakya, Turkey, and Bilginsoy reported from Istanbul. Bassem Mroue in Beirut, Ghaith Alsayed in Bab al-Hawa, Syria, Sarah El Deeb in Antakya, Turkey, and Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, contributed to this report.

___

Follow AP's earthquake coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/earthquakes