VIDEO: 26 dead as major quake hits Greece, Turkey
People work on a collapsed building, in Izmir, Turkey, on Friday. AP
Gulf Today Report
A strong earthquake of magnitude of up to 7.0 struck the Aegean Sea on Friday. The quake was felt in Turkey and Greece, local and international observatories said.
At least 26 people have been died, and over 420 were injured in Turkey earthquake, health officials said. A hospital official said the death toll is expected to rise.
Aslı Eroğlu, a Turkish woman in Izmir spoke to Gulf Today after the earthquake.
Aslı said, “The earthquake was very bad, I really still couldn't come back to myself…”
She and her friend Hasan Iyibildiren shared dramatic video clips from the Izmir incident.
A video showed a multistoreyed building crashing down. The site was engulfed in dust after the collapse.
Mayor of Konya Metropolitan Municipality, Uğur İbrahim Altay said on Twitter, “Our search and rescue teams are ready to move to affected earthquake area if needed…”
İbrahim again tweeted, “In the first stage, our search and rescue team of 12 people moved to the affected area.”
People flooded the streets in the Turkish coastal city of Izmir after the earthquake, witnesses said. Footage from Turkish state broadcaster TRT Haber showed a collapsed building in central Izmir.
A video showed an injured man in his 40s was looking his relative after the collapse of a building.
Several people could be heard reciting verses of the Holy book in Izmir amid the cries of people stuck under the debris of a building.
Local media reported around 20 building collapsed in Izmir.
Rescue officials and youth joined hands to search for survivors in the rubble.
Residents of Samos, an island with a population of about 45,000, were urged to stay away from coastal areas, Eftyhmios Lekkas, head of Greece's organisation for anti-seismic planning, told Greece's Skai TV.
"It was a very big earthquake, it's difficult to have a bigger one," said Lekkas. Ali Yerlikaya, the governor of Istanbul, where the quake was also felt, said there were no negative reports.
