A 7.2-magnitude earthquake, occurred Sunday in the eastern Turkish province of Van, near the border with Iran, according to the American Institute of Geological Survey. Authorities fear that up to 1,000 people died. American Institute of Geophysics (USGS) said that the earthquake in eastern Turkey had a magnitude of 7.2, occurring at a depth of 7.2 km. The quake occurred at 13.41 local time, about 20 kilometers from the Turkish city of Van, located in the region of the same name.
“It’s a strong earthquake, it may cause between 500 and 1,000 deaths”, said, during a press conference, Gedik Mustafa, head of Kandilli seismology Institute in Istanbul. “The earthquake was strongly felt in Van (city with 380,000 inhabitants) and its surroundings, causing casualties and property damage, according to the first information”, announced the emergency organization in Ankara, without specifying the number of deaths. Many people are buried under the rubble, writes the press.
Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Besir Atalay said that about 40 buildings, including a boarding school, collapsed in the province of Van, located in eastern Turkey and inhabited mostly by Kurds. The largest losses were found in Erciş, a city with 100,000 inhabitants. An AFP photographer saw massive damage on the main street. Many people leave the city remained without electricity, forming columns on the highway. Fearing aftershocks, people refuse to enter their houses and prepare to spend the night in the open around fires, awaiting for the tents promised by the authorities.
NTV news television said that only in one city there are 1,000 people injured. “I saw three or four bodies taken from an eight-story building that collapsed”, said for AFP Salim, a 30-year-old resident. “There are 24 apartments in this building”, he said, fearing for the lives of other tenants. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who was in Istanbul (west) when the earthquake was felt in neighboring provinces and in Iran, went to Van with several ministers.
“The quake caused a great panic”, the mayor of Van, Bekir Kaya, said, stressing that the city’s telephone network was heavily damaged. The images broadcast by NTV show dozens of people who seek among the ruins of an eight-floor building located in the city of Van, without waiting for the rescue teams to come. Nightfall has hampered rescue operations which continued under the light from generators, while the temperature would not exceed 3 degrees Celsius in the earthquake area, according to weather forecasts. The Turkish Red Crescent has sent tents and personal in the affected area. The army also sent rescue teams to the affected areas.
An earthquake of this magnitude is more likely to cause substantial damage to Turkey since numerous homes were built without seismic compliance, seismologists warned. Several countries, including Israel, which is under a diplomatic crisis with Turkey, have offered to help. Two earthquakes produced in industrialized regions of the northwest have killed 20,000 people in August and November 1999. In 1976, an earthquake killed 3,800 people in Caldiran in the province of Van.