Estimate that the dead from the killers earthquakes V Turkey will reach 50,000 people, said a professor of geology and disaster management at the University of Athens and president of the OASP, Efthymyos Lekkaswhile he is in a neighboring country with EMAK members trying to escape under the rubble and a group of teachers from Greece.

They have already covered almost the entire territory affected by the earthquake in Turkey and Syria, trying to help the residents of the region in any way they can. As Mr. Lekkas told the Athens and Macedonian news agency, the area devastated by the earthquake includes 12 cities and is roughly the size of Greece. He also talks about one of the biggest disasters he has ever faced.

The Greek team managed to rescue several people stuck in the ruins of Antioch. Among them were three children. “From the first moment we arrived, we have dedicated ourselves to rescue work. So far, we have rescued five people and are trying to find others to rescue, but in very adverse conditions, time is running out,” Mr. Lekkas told APE. -MPE, while explaining that “there is a whole spotting methodology. Initially, due to the fact that the chaos is essentially informational, we relied on residents who told us that they had relatives that they heard in the ruins. Then the EMAK employees carry out a very dangerous operation to break into the buildings.” Mr. Lekkas also adds that it will be very difficult to find survivors from now on, because, he says, it is very cold and trapped people, many of whom are injured, cannot hold out under the rubble for long.

Factors leading to the disaster

According to a professor of geology and natural disasters at the University of Athens, besides the obvious and most important factor, namely the strong earthquakes that hit the neighboring country, the destruction of so many buildings and the loss of so many human lives as a result. “The second factor was the foundation soils. In many areas, but not in all. That is, these were very loose soils, which increased the seismic movement. The third factor is that earthquake regulation is inferior to ours. The fourth factor was building materials. Construction in the area as a whole is degrading. The fifth factor is that their buildings are architecturally beautiful from the outside, they have some features, but it was these architectural features that were the most dangerous in the buildings. These were asymmetrical buildings, they had extensions, the masonry was not connected with the coke frame.”

“The country is in chaos. The dead will exceed 50,000″

According to Mr. Lekkas, there is an absolute difficulty “both for the rescue teams, and for us, who came first, and for the residents, who will have to endure this situation for a few more years. It is very difficult from one moment to the next, while you have your home and your family, to suddenly be overboard. And this is true for more than a million people. According to my estimates, based on scientific data, the death toll could exceed 50,000 people. If you count the collapsed buildings, the number of people inside, the fact that the collapse was instantaneous, and the fact that it was night, everything indicates that we will have several tens of thousands of victims.” The surviving residents of the area have not yet recovered from the shock, Mr. Lekkas told APE-MBE, and he estimates that any rescue teams will not be enough. “Thousands of points of intervention. At the moment we have about 25 overseas missions that can take on an operational role, which is very difficult. There are also local missions, but no matter how many there were, it would not have been possible to cope with the situation,” Mr. Lekkas reasoned.

“Things are even worse in Syria”

Considering that the country is already in a state of war, it is still more difficult there. “They only allowed rescuers to come on Wednesday, the situation is even more difficult, although the earthquake there was less strong and the consequences were of a smaller scale,” Mr. Lekkas explained. Some areas affected by the earthquake are under the control of Damascus, while others are under the control of the rebels. After the bombing of 11 years of civil war, the remaining buildings are heavily damaged. “There are fewer dead because the affected area is on the edge of the fault and less populated. It does not have the same population density as the affected area in Turkey,” he stressed.

“Greece has no reason to worry about the earthquake in Turkey”

Although the radius that can be affected by an earthquake reaches up to 300 kilometers, as Mr. Lekkas confirms, Greece is very far away and therefore there is no cause for concern. “An activated fault is a fault that has caused a lot of earthquakes, and it is it that greatly facilitates the transport of the Arabian plate, which enters Turkey like a wedge,” concluded Mr. Lekkas.

^{Source: RES-IPE}