Woman Rescued from Turkey Quake Debris after 66 Hours
A 27-year-old woman was rescued from under tons of debris from a collapsed building 66 hours after an earthquake struck eastern Turkey and killed hundreds of people on Sunday, ABC News reported.
Gozde Bahar, an English teacher, was pulled out alive Wednesday in Ercis, the same town from which 2-week-old Baby Azra was rescued a day earlier.
The provincial capital Van and Ercis are the hardest hit zones by Sunday's quake. Tens of thousands have been left homeless by the powerful 7.2 magnitude quake, according to ABC.
As Bahar was already being rushed to hospital, her heart stopped for a moment.
"Of course I still have hope," Bahar's fiance, Hasan Gurcan, 29, told Reuters. The poor gentleman was in between jubilation for loved one's rescue, and anxiety for the medical danger she could be in after the rescue.
"We have hope. There are always miracles. Normally, we do not expect anyone to survive after 72 hours, but people have survived longer than that before," said a rescue official standing by the collapsed building where Azra was found.
Meanwhile, the survivors' complaints over the lack of tents for their shelter have persisted amid continuing rescue efforts for anyone who might still be alive under heavy debris in Ercis and Van.
People receiving tents being distributed by relief workers from the back of a truck have been seen to fight over a few supplies for too many warm bodies chilling in the night.
While he initially said Turkey had hoped to manage the disaster alone, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government Tuesday made requests to other countries for emergency materials, including prefabricated housing, tents and containers.