Hope for rescue fades as earthquake death toll tops 28,000

Adiyaman, Turkey — Death toll surpasses 28,000, days later growing desperate for those hoping to find living relatives among the rubble two earthquakes Ruined Turkey and Syria.

But as rescue workers continued a round-the-clock search Saturday in sub-zero temperatures, the chances of finding any survivors were slim. Trapped in a concrete pile of collapsed houses And apartment blocks are getting slimmer, and the United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator warned that the death toll could double.

In Turkey, 67 people have been dragged from the rubble in the past 24 hours, Vice President Fuat Oktay told reporters late Friday, according to an Associated Press report. He added that about 80,000 people are being treated in hospitals and more than one million are homeless and in temporary shelters.

In his comments, NBC News reported that 33-year-old Ozlem Yilmaz and her 6-year-old daughter Zeliha were pulled from the rubble of buildings in the southeastern city of Adiyaman by Turkish miners with the help of US rescuers. Served after being witnessed being pulled out.

“This is a miracle. Can a person live five days in the rubble?”

However, Yavuz’s joy was soon tempered by the fact that Ozlem’s 11-year-old daughter Zeynep had died. Her husband, his cousin Oguzan Ilmaz, 43, was confirmed dead on Saturday.

Local media reported on Saturday that more people had been rescued from the rubble, but UN emergency relief coordinator Martin Griffiths warned the death toll was likely to rise.

“I think it’s hard to give an exact estimate because you have to go under the rubble, but I’m pretty sure it’s more than double,” he told British broadcaster Sky News on Saturday. “It’s scary. This is nature fighting back in a really tough way.” (Sky News is owned by NBC News’ parent company, his Comcast.)

Monday’s devastating first earthquake struck Turkey and neighboring Syria early in the morning, registering a magnitude of 7.8. It is classified as “major” on the official luminosity scale. A few hours later, his second quake of magnitude 7.6 struck nearby.