Powerful Earthquake Kills Over 1,800 In Turkey And Syria

 Turkey's Anadolu news agency, citing the country's disaster agency, reported that another 7.6-magnitude earthquake struck Elbistan district in Kahramanmaras province in southern Turkey. This morning at 4:17 local time, there was a very strong earthquake in Turkey. The intensity of this earthquake was also estimated at 7.8 on the Richter scale.

These tremors have come again not only in Turkey but also in Syria in Damascus, Latakia and other Syrian provinces. Syria's Sanaa news agency reported another earthquake in Syria today.

This  devastating earthquake  occurred near Gaziantep in the south of Turkey this morning can be gauged from the fact that its intensity was recorded at 7.8 on the Richter scale. According to the German Research Center for Geoscience GFZ, the epicenter of the earthquake was 18 kilometers below the ground. The earthquake has also caused massive devastation in the southeastern region of Turkey and Syria.

According to reports,, the death toll from earthquakes in Turkey and Syria is continuously increasing.This number has crossed the figure of 1800 now. Apart from this, more than 5,ooo people are stated to be injured. Reports said,at least 6 times strong earthquake tremors have been felt in Turkey. Turkish president Erdogan urged people not to enter damaged buildings.

The quake, which was centered north of the Turkish provincial capital of Gaziantep, was felt as far away as Cairo. It sent residents of Damascus rushing into the street, and jolted awake people in their beds in Beirut.

It struck a region that has been shaped on both sides of the border by more than a decade of civil war in Syria. The opposition-held regions in Syria are packed with some 4 million people displaced from other parts of the country by the fighting.

Many of them live in buildings that are already wrecked from past bombardments,hundreds of families remained trapped in rubble, the opposition emergency organization, called the White Helmets, said in a statement.

Thousands of buildings were reported collapsed in a wide area extending from Syria’s cities of Aleppo and Hama to Turkey’s Diyarbakir, more than 330 kilometers (200 miles) to the northeast. A hospital collapsed in the Mediterranean coastal city of Iskenderun, but casualties were not immediately known, his vice president, Fuat Oktay, said.

In Turkey, mosques around the region were opened to provide shelter for people unable to return to damaged homes amid temperatures that hovered around freezing.

The quake heavily damaged Gaziantep’s most famed landmark, its historic castle perched atop a hill in the center of the city. Parts of the fortresses’ walls and watch towers were leveled and other parts heavily damaged, images from the city showed.