At least 14 dead in Turkey as shocking videos show victims being swept away by floodwaters
Flash floods in Turkey have killed at least 14 people after torrential rains hit two provinces that were devastated by last month’s earthquake.
At least five other people were also reported missing, officials and news outlets said Wednesday.
The terrible weather has added to the misery of thousands of people left homeless after last month’s devastating 7.8-magnitude earthquake that killed some 52,000 people in the country and in Syria, the deadliest in the region in recent years. modern times.
Many of those who have died in the floods were living in tents and container houses set up in quake-hit southeastern Turkey, according to news reports.
Torrential rains hit the area Tuesday night and the weather service expects them to last through Wednesday night.
Shocking images of rising water showed helpless victims being swept away as cars were swept away by water down roads that had turned into streams.
The rescue team carries out the evacuation operation of the citizens after the devastating downpour hit the city of Sanliurfa
Several people were swept away by the current of water, which turned the streets into muddy rivers in the affected areas last month.
A man was filmed helplessly being dragged through the cascading murky water, unable to stop as he navigated a road in the city of Sanliurfa.
Other terror images showed floodwaters washing away cars and inundating temporary housing set up for earthquake victims.
Hundreds of thousands of earthquake survivors in Turkey have been relocated to tents and container houses across the disaster region, which covers 11 provinces.
One person died in the city of Tut, in the southeastern province of Adiyaman, after rising waters washed away a container house that was used to house a family of earthquake survivors.
It was later reported that a one-year-old boy died in the disaster.
Salih Ayhan, governor of neighboring Sanliurfa province, about 50 kilometers (30 miles) north of the Syrian border, told Turkish television that four people died from flooding in his region.
Rescuers later found five more bodies belonging to Syrian citizens inside a flooded basement apartment in Sanliurfa, Turkey’s DHA news agency reported.
Two more deaths were later reported.
Cars and debris scattered during flooding after heavy rain and flooding in Sanliurfa
Turkish soldiers and rescue team carry out evacuation operation of citizens in Sanliurfa
Police divers, known as ‘frogmen’, carry out a search and rescue operation at the flooded crossroads after downpours hit Sanliurfa.
The Turkish Police Department conducts a search and rescue operation in the flooded area.
A view of flood waters in Sanliurfa, southeastern Turkey, after flash floods killed at least 10 people living in tents and containers.
Turkish soldiers and rescue team carry out evacuation operation with boats and heavy machinery for citizens
Boat rescuers save people from cascading water in devastated Sanliurfa region
People are rescued during flooding by an excavator after heavy rain in Sanliurfa killed 13 people
Three people are still missing in Adiyaman and two in Sanliurfa, according to local reports.
Several people were evacuated from a sodden camp where earthquake survivors were sheltering in tents.
Floods also reached the ground floor of one of the region’s main hospitals, the Sanliurfa governor’s office said.
Turkey’s disaster management agency said more than a dozen professional divers were involved in the rescue efforts in each of the two provinces.
A 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck parts of Turkey and Syria on February 6, killing more than 52,000 people, the vast majority in Turkey. More than 200,000 buildings in Turkey collapsed or suffered heavy damage.
Facing a difficult re-election in May, President Erdogan now faces a furious public backlash over his government’s stuttering response to the biggest natural disaster of his rule in two decades.
Erdogan has issued several public apologies and has also stressed that no nation could have quickly dealt with a disaster on such a scale.
Erdogan has spent the past few weeks touring the region, meeting with survivors and vowing to rebuild the entire area within a year.
Police and rescue team members carry the body of a person during flooding after heavy rain in Sanliurfa.
Turkish soldiers and rescue team carry out evacuation operation with boats
Turkish soldiers in a boat rescue an elderly man from torrential weather amid flooding
Civilians are being evacuated by boat from the Akabe neighborhood due to flash flooding
Heavy rains triggered flooding in Adiyaman and Sanliurfa, which were hit by earthquakes in Turkey last month.
Turkey Police Department devewrs, known as ‘frogmen’, carry out a search and rescue operation at the flooded crossroad after downpour hit Sanliurfa.
Turkish soldiers and rescue team carry out an evacuation operation in the devastated region.
A man is pulled in a wheelchair as civilians were evacuated from the Akabe neighborhood due to flash floods in Sanliurfa.
Turkish soldiers and rescue teams carry children as they proceed with a citizen evacuation operation in Sanliurfa.
“By the end of next year, we will build 319,000 houses,” Erdogan told members of his ruling party in a parliamentary speech on Wednesday.
“Beyond the search and rescue, emergency relief and temporary shelter we have provided so far, we have a promise to our nation to restore the cities destroyed by the earthquake within a year,” he said.
Erdogan sent his interior minister to the flooded region to oversee the government’s response.
“Currently, we have 10 teams consisting of 163 people carrying out search and rescue work in a stretch of 25 kilometers,” Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu told reporters.
We also have divers. But the weather conditions do not allow us to do much, ”he said.