A newborn baby discovered under rubble in a northwestern Syrian town with her umbilical cord still connected to her mother is improving in the hospital. Video / AP
Pulled from the rubble, İbrahim Kantarcı was delicately passed down through the ruins of a crumpled apartment block by a crowd of more than 100 men working methodically and heroically as one.
The student, whose LinkedIn profile depicts a strong young man in his early 20s, was barely conscious; hehad spent more than four days – 104 hours – trapped in Kahramanmaraş, a city of 500,000 near the epicentre of Monday’s quake.
Inshallah – God wills it! – was the cry from the crowd. His mother, who had been keeping vigil since Monday, simply fell to her knees. “I am in shock, I cannot speak,” she said, her frame racked with unbearable anxiety, her eyes full of tears.
Kantarcı was not the only one found alive in Turkey and Syria.
Rescuers and residents search through the rubble of collapsed buildings in the town of Harem near the Turkish border, Idlib province, Syria. Photo / AP
Hours earlier, a newborn baby and his mother were discovered in a ruined structure in Hatay – a coastal town 150 km to the south – which has also suffered catastrophic losses.
Other rescues included a family of six who were pulled from a single building; a teenager from Gaziantep who drank his own urine to survive and a four-year-old boy who was offered a jelly bean to calm him down as he was lifted out of rubble.
In total, more than 8,000 people have been pulled alive from collapsed buildings, according to Turkish officials.
“Local responders are continuing to search tirelessly,” said Mark Kaye, of the International Rescue Committee.
“Seeing people being pulled from collapsed buildings and infrastructure reminds us of the essential work being carried out by civilians, volunteers and rescue teams on the ground in affected areas.”
The family of six was found in a high-rise apartment block in Iskenderun. HaberTurk television showed jubilant scenes, including one of the rescued woman waving at onlookers as she was being carried away on a stretcher.
The building was only 180m from the Mediterranean and narrowly avoided being flooded when water surged into the centre of the city in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake.
Although every life pulled from the rubble is celebrated, and momentarily lifts the mood, they remain the exception and are becoming increasingly rare.
Even as Kantarcı was pulled from the rubble alive in Kahramanmaraş, five bodies lay lifeless in bags across the road.
The 8,000 said to have been saved stood against an official death toll of 22,000 on Friday – a figure that is certain to rise significantly higher in the days and weeks to come.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan admitted for the first time on Friday that his government’s search-and-rescue operation was not moving as quickly as hoped.
“So many buildings were damaged that unfortunately, we were not able to speed up our interventions as quickly as we had desired,” he said during a visit to the southern city of Adiyaman.
Away from the cameras hoping to capture signs of life, mechanical diggers are now increasingly unearthing corpses.
In Kahramanmaraş, we watched one such excavation. Almost every time the digger’s metal arm reached into the rubble, another body was unearthed.
Talha Yusuf, who is waiting for news on his wife’s sister, points to a body left close to the wreckage, wrapped in a black bag.
“We do not know who it is,” the 18-year-old says.
“They were taken from the wreckage and left.”
Although aid groups and rescue teams are ramping up efforts to tackle the mounting crisis in Turkey and Syria, politics have obstructed the disaster response.
It emerged on Friday that, the day before, an aid convoy from Syria’s Kurdish-led region to earthquake-hit areas in the government-controlled northwest were turned back, denying the affected populations vital support.
Both sides traded blame for why the convoy didn’t cross, accusing each other of trying to politicise aid.
A baby girl who was born under the rubble caused by an earthquake that hit Syria and Turkey receives treatment inside an incubator at a children's hospital in the town of Afrin, Aleppo. Photo / AP
After facing pressure from the United Nations, the Syrian government announced on Friday that it had approved the delivery of humanitarian relief to areas outside its control.
But how long this fragile peace holds for – and whether support will arrive in time to salvage the country’s trapped earthquake victims – remains to be seen.
Meanwhile the displaced people of Syria and Turkey push on with what little they have. They are everywhere – on road sides, in cars, under highways and bridges. Despite this, they continue to hold hope for a brighter future. There is no alternative.
Outside of Kahramanmaraş, next to a white-marbled mosque and small cemetery, a homeless family settles in for what is set to be another freezing night under the stars. But all are smiling.
Their daughter, no more than 18 months old, runs over and offers high fives to those standing around her, oblivious of the destitution around her.
The family say they have heard about the “miracles” of lives saved. They pray that there will be more to come.
