Two violent earthquakes hit southeastern Turkey in the early morning local time on Monday (February 6). Seismologists said that the interval between the two earthquakes was only about 10 minutes. According to Reuters, at least 4,000 people were killed and tens of thousands were injured in the two countries.
About 3,000 people died and tens of thousands were injured in Turkey alone. The government and aid workers in neighboring Syria say at least thousands of people have been injured and killed across the country.
In response to the severe earthquake disaster in the two countries, governments and organizations of many countries have dispatched rescue personnel, provided relevant search and rescue equipment and financial assistance to the disaster area.
The European Union has mobilized search and rescue teams to help Turkey, and its Copernicus satellite system has also launched an emergency image service to help Syria with its humanitarian aid program.
The Chinese rescue team sent a rescue team to the hardest-hit area in Turkey on the morning of the 7th, and Taiwan dispatched the first batch of search and rescue teams to assist in the rescue of Turkey on the 6th.
The United States is coordinating the timely rescue of Turkey; the Russian rescue team is also preparing to fly to Syria, and the Russian army deployed there has sent 300 people to rescue.
The 7.4-magnitude quake was epicentered in the province of Kahramanmaras, near the Syrian border, according to Turkey's Disaster and Accident Management Agency (AFAD). Shortly thereafter, another magnitude 6.6 quake was measured in Gaziantep province.
In an updated assessment, Germany's Potsdam Center for Geosciences gave magnitudes of 7.8 and 6.7. The tremor's shaking was also felt in Israel, according to official reports.
The full extent of the damage caused by the natural disaster was not yet clear, with Turkish Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu telling media that provinces in the southeastern part of the country were most affected. The earthquake caused the collapse of many buildings in the area. Rescue teams from all over the country are being called to support. Soylu also appealed to the international community for assistance through the media.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan tweeted: "We hope we can get through this disaster together in the shortest possible time and with the least loss." The Turkish military has established an air corridor to enable search and rescue teams to reach the disaster area as quickly as possible. "We mobilized planes to send medical teams, search and rescue teams and their vehicles to the quake zone," Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said.
Buildings in several Syrian cities also collapsed, according to the Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA). Photos showed rescue teams carrying people away on stretchers. The Syrian Arab News Agency quoted Raed Ahmed, head of the National Seismological Center, as writing that it was the strongest earthquake in Syria since 1995.
EU crisis management executive Janez Lenarcic confirmed that rescue teams from the Netherlands and Romania were on their way to Turkey to help local institutions. White House national security adviser Sullivan said the United States was ready to help. The German government has pledged support to the local people, with Foreign Minister Berbock tweeting: "We will quickly launch assistance with our partners."
Turkey is located in one of the most seismically active regions in the world, where the two largest continental plates, Africa and Eurasia, meet. In 1999, more than 17,000 people were killed in a 7.4-magnitude earthquake in northwestern Turkey.