They remained under the rubble for more than 260 hours before being rescued. Three new survivors, including a 14-year-old boy, have been pulled from the ruins of collapsed buildings in Antakya, southern Turkey, hit by devastating earthquakes on Monday February 6. Mustafa, 33, and Mehmet, 26, were rescued “261 hours” after the earthquake, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca announced on Twitter. CNN Türk TV channel featured them as Mustafa Avci and Mehmet Ali Sakiroglu respectively.
Just before, at the “260th hour”, a 14-year-old boy was also extracted from the ruins of his building in the center of Antakya “after intense efforts”, reported the minister. Fahrettin Koca specifies that the teenager named Osman underwent “an intervention” in a hospital in the province, without specifying the seriousness, but he appears conscious in the photo.
According to the DHA news agency, the two men, Mehmet and Mustafa were in the rubble of the same building, in the center of Antakya, when they were discovered by the emergency services. The Minister indicates that they were immediately taken to the hospital. “Our brother Mustafa remembered the phone number of a relative that he was able to call”, says the minister who also broadcasts a short video. We hear the young man asking: “Is my mother okay? » and display a broad smile when his interlocutor, in tears, answers him: « Everyone is fine! “.
Low chance of survival
The latest official toll from the 7.8 magnitude earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria exceeds 41,000 dead. The last survivors discovered by the rescuers, while the search is gradually ceasing, were all found in the province of Hatay, around Antakya, near the Syrian border.
The chances of survival now seem lower, further north, around the epicenter of the earthquake in mountainous regions such as Kahramanmaras, and even snowy regions of Elbistan and Adiyaman, where the thermometer dropped to -15°C at night. , noted the AFP teams.