The earthquake that struck Monday morning struck along the East Anatolian Fault and the San Andreas Fault in southern Turkey, and warned survivors of future disasters

Turkey’s president spoke to survivors during a visit to Kaharamanmaras, the city which was near the epicenter of the earthquake. “No one would be left in the streets despite the shortfalls that the government had after the earthquake,” Erodgan said. The president will go to Hatay on Wednesday.

Researchers say people need to prepare for more earthquakes and other weather related problems. “The possibility for major aftershocks causing even more damage will continue for weeks and months,” says Ilan Kelman, who studies disasters and health at University College London.

This is unlike the Ring of Fire, which runs along the west coast of the United States. In this zone, earthquakes and tsunamis are often caused by subduction – where one plate slides below another.

The mainshock Monday morning struck along some 125 miles of the East Anatolian Fault, a well-known fault line in southern Turkey. This earthquake was a strike-slip, meaning stress builds up between two rock formations in opposite directions until the fault comes apart. It was very shallow, meaning that it caused more intense shaking. The strike slip fault that destroyed part of San Francisco in 1906 is also the San Andreas Fault.

Turkey’s government said search and rescue teams have pulled more than eight thousand people from underneath the rubble in the past two days. Concerns grew as to whether survivors would survive due to worsening weather conditions in the region.

The effects of quake-induced seismology on the communities of Antakya, Turkey, according to humanists and naturalists

A woman in the city of Antakya stands outside the old residential building, waiting to hear if her son survived.

Aid groups consider the first 72 hours after a natural disaster as crucial for rescuing survivors. The U.S. says the Syrian government does not include humanitarian assistance in its sanctions. Regardless, northern Syria lacks the heavy equipment and other infrastructure to come to the aid of the hundreds of thousands displaced by this disaster, and the only U.N.-authorized road from Turkey to that region has been damaged by the quake.

Many countries have sent assistance to Syria, including Iran, Libya, and the United Arab Emirates, as well as Turkey, where thousands of rescue workers are arriving.

The emergency management agency in Turkey has set up tents for more than 370,000 people who have been temporarily displaced by the disaster.

The earthquake and its aftershocks have flattened buildings and sent rescuers digging through concrete debris to find survivors, with the death toll expected to increase further. A few researchers spoke to Nature about the seismology that’s taking place in the region.

Turkey’s moving east along the Anatolian Fault: the effects of a magnitude-6.5 earthquake on buildings in Syria and the Turkish economy

Most of Turkey sits on the Anatolian plate between two major faults: the North Anatolian Fault and the East Anatolian Fault. The tectonic plate that carries Arabia, including Syria, is moving northwards and colliding with the southern rim of Eurasia, which is squeezing Turkey out towards the west, says David Rothery, a geoscientist at the Open University in Milton Keynes, UK. “Turkey is moving west about 2 centimetres per year along the East Anatolian Fault,” he adds. “Half the length of this fault is lit up now with earthquakes.”

In a study1 published last March in Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering, Arzu Arslan Kelam at the Middle East Technical University, Ankara, and her colleagues suggested that the centre of the city of Gaziantep would experience medium-to-severe damage from a magnitude-6.5 earthquake. Most buildings are low-rise brick structures that are very close to each other.

Things are not as good in Syria, where conflicts since 2001 have made building standards impossible to enforce. Building collapsed in the earthquake that struck Syria’s northwestern regions. Some war-damaged buildings in Syria have been rebuilt using low-quality materials or “whatever materials are available”, says Rothery. “They might have fallen down more readily than things that were built at somewhat greater expense. We’ve yet to find out,” he adds.

The weather is going to drop below freezing tonight. People who are stuck in the rubble, who may be saved, could freeze to death. So these hazards continue,” he adds.

The scale of the earthquake made it hard to reach everyone. He said nobody would be left in the streets.

Istanbul’s stock exchange closed until Feb. 15 after initial trading showed rapid declines, triggering a circuit breaker when declines reached 7%. The Turkish economy was already reeling from out-of-control inflation.

Why is the earthquake so bad when it hits? “Earthquake Turkey syria why deadly intl”, said Emir Erdik

Rescue teams are still desperately searching for signs of life beneath the rubble of collapsed buildings amid grim conditions, but days on from the massive tremblor, the chances of finding survivors lessen with every passing hour.

The earthquake was so lethal due to a number of factors. One of them is the time of day it occurred. With the quake hitting early in the morning, many people were in their beds when it happened, and are now trapped under the rubble of their homes.

Additionally, with a cold and wet weather system moving through the region, poor conditions have made reaching affected areas trickier, and rescue and recovery efforts on both sides of the border significantly more challenging once teams have arrived.

The type of collapse that we engineers don’t like to see is the pancake collapse, which is the thing that strikes most. It is very difficult to save lives in such collapses. It makes it extremely difficult for the search and rescue teams.

“If you are not designing these structures for the seismic intensity that they may face in their design life, these structures may not perform well,” said Jaiswal.

Many of the buildings that have collapsed were built before1999, according to Erdik. He added there also would have been instances where some buildings didn’t conform to code.

“The codes are very modern in Turkey, very similar to US codes, but again, the codes conformity is an issue that we’ve tried to tackle with legal and administrative procedures.” he explained. Controls for construction and design are included in the permits we have. But then again, there are things that are lacking.”

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/07/middleeast/earthquake-turkey-syria-why-deadly-intl/index.html

Why are Syrian earthquakes dead in limbo? In Turkey, and in Syria, the seismology and severe weather experts urge us not to give up hope

Despite the mounting challenges, a structural engineer and humanitarian coordinator urged rescuers not to abandon hope as survivors could be found up to “weeks” after the massive earthquake hit the region. Kit Miyamoto praised the people of Turkey who came together and helped after the earthquake struck.

“The community, the citizens, they’re the ones that are actually the first line of defense,” he told CNN Wednesday. “They dug up family, friends, neighbors.”

But other experts warn that the window for post-earthquake search-and-rescue is rapidly closing. Ilan Kelman, professor of disasters and health at University College London, said: “Typically, few survivors are pulled out after 72 hours – yet every life saved is essential and some people are extricated after many days.”

In Turkey and Syria, time is the enemy. People die because of immediate medical needs, including bleeding to death, or succumbing to crush injuries, as well as due to the weather, which has dropped below freezing at night, and so people die through Hypothermia. Many people die of lack of food and water.

Many may recognize the term “Richter Scale” which scientists previously used for many years, but these days they generally follow the Modified Mercalli Intensity Scale (MMI), which is a more accurate measure of a quake’s size, according to the USGS.

The power of an earthquake is measured by the magnitude. The intensity of the shaking can vary depending on the local geography and topography, and depth of the quake. The increase of one whole number to 32 times more energy is called the magnitude scale.

The location of a 8.1 magnitude earthquake that struck near the South Sandwich Islands in the southern Atlantic Ocean in 2021, made it the strongest quake to hit anywhere in the world.

In this case we need to talk about the epi line, according to CNN’s severe weather expert Chad Myers.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/07/middleeast/earthquake-turkey-syria-why-deadly-intl/index.html

The 2011 Japan quake and tsunami left widespread destruction in the city of Nurdagi, a country with a magnitude of 9.1

The plates move horizontally instead of vertically in a strike slip. “Why that matters is because the buildings don’t want to go back and forth. The secondary waves begin to go back and forth as well.

In comparison with other large earthquakes around the world, the 2011 Japan quake and tsunami – in which more than 22,000 people were killed or went missing – registered a magnitude of 9.1.

That incident left widespread destruction in its wake after walls of water engulfed entire towns, dragged houses onto highways and caused the country’s worst nuclear disaster on record.

Dozens of buildings across the city have collapsed. There is a group of flattened residential buildings just west of the Hac Ali ztrk mosque.

The debris of those two buildings, four and six stories tall, litter the street. One of the roofs appears to remain intact, despite the building underneath collapsing.

The town’s “Great Garden,” normally a verdant green space with benches and shops, is now full of tents, likely to shelter survivors and emergency crews.

At least two large high-rise buildings, located just south of the park, have collapsed. Three more on the northern side of the park have also collapsed.

A significant number of vehicles are seen in the area. Like in other parts of the Nurdagi, some of the buildings that are still standing have a significant amounts of debris surrounding them.

The Narli family in Elbistan, a city in central Kahramanmaras, following a large earthquake on Monday

The Narli family was rescued from their house in central Kahramanmaras 133 hours after the earthquake struck. First, 12-year-old Nehir Naz Narli was saved, then both of her parents.

A family of five were rescued earlier in the day from a mound of debris in the town of Nurdagi in Gaziantep province. Rescuers cheered and chanted, “God is Great!” The last family member was lifted to safety.

He said that there were no stone left in some settlements close to the fault line.

Melisa Ulku, a woman in her 20s, was extricated from the rubble in Elbistan in the 132th hour since the quake, following the rescue of another person at the same site in the same hour. Ahead of her rescue, police announced that people shouldn’t cheer or clap in order to not interfere with other rescue efforts nearby. She was covered in a thermal blanket on a stretcher. People were hugging. Some shouted “God is great!”

Just an hour earlier, a 3-year-old girl and her father were pulled from debris in the town of Islahiye, also in Gaziantep province, and soon after a 7-year-old girl was rescued in the province of Hatay.

The rescues brought smiles to many despite the tremendous destruction and deaths caused by Monday’s 7.8-magnitude quake and the powerful aftershock hours later that caused thousands of buildings to collapse.

Not everything ended so well. Rescuers reached a 13-year-old girl inside the debris of a collapsed building in Hatay province early Saturday and intubated her. She died before the medical teams could remove a limb and free her from the rubble.

The Indian Army’s medical assistance team began to treat the injured in a temporary field hospital when aid began to arrive.

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

Source: https://www.npr.org/2023/02/11/1156313344/turkey-syria-earthquake-death-toll-survivors

Syrian earthquake death toll survivors in Istanbul: The first day of operations of the graveyard in a ruined patch of Turkey’s northern outskirts

I buried everyone that I lost before coming 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 8 ½ months pregnant.

A graveyard was under construction on the side of the road. The northeastern edge of the city was a wasteland as bulldozers and backhoes dug pits in the field that was soon to be filled with bodies. Soldiers directing traffic on the busy adjacent road warned motorists not to take photographs.

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

“People who are coming out from the rubble now, it’s a miracle if they survive. He said that most of the people who came out now are dead.

Many people in the region don’t have a place to stay because of the cold. While the Turkish government has distributed millions of hot meals, they are still struggling to reach many people in need.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2023/02/11/1156313344/turkey-syria-earthquake-death-toll-survivors

World Health Organization and Damned Building Amnesties in Syria: Assad’s visit to the northwestern rebel-held region of Aleppo

Assad and his wife Asma visited Duha and her son in the morning, after he was pulled out of rubble the night before, according to Syrian state TV.

The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, arrived in Syria’s northern city of Aleppo on Saturday, bringing with him 35 tons of medical equipment, state news agency SANA reported. He said another plane carrying an additional 30 tons of medical equipment will arrive in the coming days.

Many of the people who have died in Syria’s northwestern rebel-held region are women and children. The death toll in Turkey was 21,043, while the death toll in Syria was 3,553.

He said that he had solved the problems of 205,000 Hatay citizens with the help of the amnesties, being used to facilitate construction practices that could leave buildings unable to resist earthquakes.

Duvar cited a senior Istanbul city official, Bugra Gokce, who gave a breakdown of the tens of thousands of building amnesty certificates granted before the 2018 general election in 10 provinces struck by the earthquake. The official said there were more than 40,000 amnesty certificates in Gaziantep province.

According to Turkish media reports, the amnesty meant that some builders needed to pay a fine but their projects could still go forward if they didn’t meet restrictions.

The association added, “In our country, zoning amnesties have been one of the most important incentives for illegal construction and have made it uncertain for the society to live in healthy and safe houses.” The group said that the practice has been used for the sake of political gain.

Implications of the earthquake in Turkey on the population of a town with 1000 houses, as Irfan Aksu told the Demioren News Agency

A verdant olive grove was cleaved into two during last week’s devastating earthquake in Turkey, creating a valley 984 feet long (about 300 meters) that now divides the area.

Irfan Aksu, who lives in the neighborhood, told Turkish news agency Demioren News Agency that when the earthquake started last Monday it created “an incredible sound” where he lived.

He asked experts to look for damage in the future. “This is not a small town, there are 1000 houses, and 7000 thousand people live here,” he said. If it were closer, the event would have taken place in our town.