A gut-wrenching photo of a father trapped under a slab of concrete holding his dead daughter’s hand has left people around the world gasping as Turkey and Syria are rocked by a monster earthquake in the region. Fighting has since killed over 5,100 people. .
The disturbing photo was taken in Kahramanmaras, Turkey, where rescue workers worked to clear the rubble of an apartment building that was brought down by a 7.8-magnitude earthquake on Monday.
The photo shows Mesut Henser, dressed in a bright orange coat, sitting on a pile of rubble with reflective strips and holding the lifeless hand of his 15-year-old daughter, Ermak, stuck under a large block of concrete. fell on the girl’s bed, crushing her to death.
A UNICEF official had earlier warned that thousands of children could be among the dead.
A Syrian man was seen holding a dead girl in his arms as he walked away from the rubble of a collapsed two-story building, the Associated Press reported.
He and a woman wrapped the girl in a large blanket and sat her on the floor to protect her from the rain.
But there have also been reports of children being rescued from collapsed buildings, including a newborn who was found alive and still attached to its mother by its umbilical cord, at a family home in northern Syria. She died inside.
A young girl, Noor, was pulled alive from the rubble of a collapsed building in the northwestern Syrian town of Jandris on Monday.
A rescuer cradled her head in his hands and gently brushed the dirt from around her eyes as she lay amid crushed concrete and twisted metal before being pulled out.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has said that the death toll from the initial earthquakes and aftershocks in Turkey and Syria could reach 20,000.
World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in Geneva that it is now a race against time. “Every minute, every hour that passes, the chances of finding survivors diminish.”
Rescue teams and civilians worked in freezing temperatures – sometimes with their bare hands – searching through the remains of buildings for trapped survivors and bodies of loved ones.
The death toll in Turkey has risen to 3,549, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Tuesday as he declared a state of emergency in 10 earthquake-hit provinces.
Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) said the earthquakes destroyed 5,775 buildings and injured 20,426 people.
The death toll was just over 1,700, according to a rescue service in Syria’s government- and rebel-held northwest.
At least 812 people were killed and 1,449 wounded in the government-held provinces of Aleppo, Latakia, Hama, Idlib and Tartus, state news agency SANA said.
The White Helmets Rescue Team said at least 900 people had been killed and 2,300 wounded in Syria’s opposition-held northwest, with the number likely to “rise dramatically”.
Bitter winter weather hampered relief operations and delivery of aid and made the plight of the displaced more miserable.
With post wires
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