“Like hundreds of thousands of other people in south-eastern Türkiye, I was fast asleep when the world began to tremble. I really don’t know how to describe it to someone who has never felt an earthquake, let alone one of the largest ever recorded in this region.
It’s just completely surreal. The floor and walls shook, buckled, and as we ran down the three floors to the street our only thought was to get far, far away from any buildings.
It was sixty seconds of the worst terror I have ever felt. Once we settled down a bit and realized we had survived the shaking, we also realized that it was raining, we were cold, and our legs felt like jelly, like they weren’t really part of our bodies. Everyone around us was shouting, shouting, shouting.
The search for survivors in Samada, Syria, continues after the February 6 earthquake.
“Indescribably sad”
It took a while, but finally, given the urgency of the second quake, we found shelter in a school. Along with hundreds of others, we sat, lay, or stood on the basketball court and informed our families that we were safe.
Then I reported to work and started thinking about how I could help, how I could tell them what’s going on, how I could pay tribute to the wonderful people who went out of their way to help me and thousands like me.
We stayed Monday night in a government run accommodation. We felt a few tremors but it was comfortable and we had hot drinks and something to eat and a place to sleep. Now I’m in the office catching up on everything, including the heartbreaking news that we’ve lost a colleague. Some others are injured and have lost family members and, in some cases, their homes. Others like my teammate only miraculously survived in Hatay.
It’s incredibly sad. One minute we’re asleep, and the next we’re part of one of the greatest catastrophes on the planet.
I am screaming inwardly in desperation, sadness and fear. But I look to my colleagues, my neighbors and my friends who are much more affected than me and they inspire me to keep going.
Massive need for protection
Türkiye is of course very prone to earthquakes and has built a first class response mechanism. We have worked with them for more than 30 years and they are phenomenal partners. But they too will be overwhelmed by it. That’s a double whammy – Over a million people who fled the war in Syria have temporary protection status in the area hardest hit by the quake.
We are speaking to the government to see how best we can help. In all situations like this, the first need is search and rescue, and I know teams from around the world are flocking to the country to help. Of course there will be a tremendous need for shelter – so many thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people will be homeless and the weather is freezing. You need a place to sleep at short notice. And they need warm clothes, water, food, heating, there will be trauma and bruises, there will be huge mental scars.
Communities are devastated: schools and hospitals are damaged, jobs destroyed. The logistics of aid will be fiendish – roads and runways need to be repaired quickly. This will be a massive rescue, response and recovery operation and we stand ready to respond in any way the government asks of us, for as long as it takes.
