Boy, 13, saved after Turkey quake

28 October 2011 rescuers drag the teenager from the collapsed building stand 09: 09 GMT

A 13-year-old boy were removed alive from the rubble in southeastern Turkey, 108 hours after an earthquake of the city devastated.

The injured boy was rescued from a collapsed building in the Ercis.

Just hours earlier a man from a flat building was freed and brought to the hospital.

The Turkish authorities say now 570 people are known, died on Sunday 7.2 magnitude quake have – more than 2,500 were injured.

So far 187 people were rescued, but hundreds are still missing and hopes fade to find more survivors.

The rescue and aid have snow and rain hampered efforts.

The rescued boy, found with the name Ferhat Tokay, late on Thursday in the life and moved from search teams early Friday morning.

"We started digging and initially we saw his hand, then we began to him talk", said Baris Dogan, Member of the rescue team told of Reuters.

He said "my feelings are inexplicable - it was out as my son,".

Ozgur Yildiz, a friend of young told of Reuters: "we do not he would die--he is a strong child believe." "I feel so good now, and I would like him to get well soon say."

Thousands of people live in the open in bitter winter conditions

Rescue workers say Ferhat Tokay was taken to the hospital, but seems to be in good health.

Search crews continue to dig out the rubble of the building after the 13-year-old was rescued, search missing after several other people from the same block, which are intended.

However stopped work at some other sites as reducing the chances of someone alive.

Persons, the on

Pouring rain and in some places by the earthquake brought snow more misery, tens of thousands of people made homeless.

Although the authorities are working on a major flaw on tents, a fifth night in the open spent many people.

Large number of men are reported to stayed have any questions, the streets of Ercis, the worst hit city, with nowhere to go, that their families in what protection was available.

In the provincial capital, van, the humid conditions make too difficult also there for the people.

Many survivors have a fifth night in the open air, try to avoid getting too cold

Nimet, a mother of three, which damaged told of Reuters that she tried, back home was.

"It looks good from the outside, but it looks inside very unstable, with all the cracks in the walls." What choice do we have but to go back to our homes? ", you said"

"Last night it was raining and all our things are still wet." "I know not how many days that we can to stay in a tent."

Relief supplies were sent from several countries.

On Thursday, the aircraft were loaded with tents in Turkey from France, the Ukraine and Israel.

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Quake rescuers save baby, Turkey requests aid

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1 of 25. The baby girl, rescued from a building that collapsed during an earthquake, rests in an incubator in a hospital in Ercis, near the eastern Turkish city of Van, in this still image taken from video footage October 25, 2011. Rescuers pulled the two-week-old baby girl alive from the arms of her mother buried under a collapsed building on Tuesday.

Credit: Reuters/Reuters TV

By Jonathon Burch and Humeyra Pamuk

ERCIS, Turkey | Tue Oct 25, 2011 3:28pm EDT

ERCIS, Turkey (Reuters) - Rescuers pulled a two-week-old baby girl alive from a collapsed apartment block on Tuesday as they battled to find survivors of an earthquake in eastern Turkey that killed more than 400 people and made tens of thousands homeless.

The baby's mother and a grandmother were also brought out alive on stretchers to jubilant cries from onlookers who followed the dramatic rescue under cold, pouring rain.

"It's a miracle!" said Senol Yigit, the uncle of the baby, Azra, whose name means "purity" or "untouched" in Arabic. "I'm so happy. What can I say? We have been waiting for two days. We had lost hope when we first saw the building," he said sobbing.

However, hope of finding more people alive under the rubble faded with every passing hour as more bodies were found.

The death toll from Sunday's 7.2-magnitude quake rose to 459, with 1,352 injured, the Disaster and Emergency Administration said. The final count was likely to rise further as many people were still missing and 2,262 buildings had collapsed.

Thousands prepared to spend a third night in freezing temperatures in crowded tents or huddled around fires across a quake-prone region in Van province, near the Iranian border.

With the government facing criticism over shortages of tents and other relief items, Turkey requested prefabricated housing and tents from more than 30 countries, including Israel, a Foreign Ministry official told Reuters.

Ties between the two former strategic allies have been frayed since Israeli commandos killed nine Turks on board a Gaza-bound flotilla last year.

Many victims accused the central government of poor organization and of being slow in delivering aid to a region inhabited mostly by minority Kurds and home to a separatist insurgency against the Turkish state. Fighting broke out among desperate victims to grab tents from overwhelmed aid workers.

Spelling more trouble for authorities, gunshots were heard as prisoners set fire to a jail and fought with guards in Van, two days after a jailbreak in which 200 were reported to have escaped in the chaos after the quake.

The ruling AK Party has apologized for distribution problems. Urgency to offer shelters was heightened by worsening weather, with the first winter snow less than a month away.

"PUSHED BACK 100 YEARS"

"We have no tents, everybody is living outdoors. Van has collapsed psychologically, life has stopped. Tens of thousands are on the streets. Everybody is in panic," Kemal Balci, a construction worker, said as he awaited news of friends injured in the quake at a hospital in Van.

"Aid has been arriving late. Van has been reduced to zero. We have no jobs, no bread, no water and there are nine members in my family. If the government doesn't give a hand to Van it will be like Afghanistan. Van has been pushed back 100 years."

The quake, Turkey's most powerful in a decade, is one more affliction for Kurds, the dominant ethnic group in impoverished southeast Turkey, where more than 40,000 people have been killed in a three-decade-long separatist insurgency.

In an escalation of hostilities, Turkish warplanes struck targets overnight in northern Iraq, where the separatist militants have bases.

About 500 soldiers have crossed the border with armored vehicles following an attack last week by Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) fighters that killed 24 Turkish troops, security sources said.

Quake rescue efforts focused on Ercis, a town of 100,000 that was worst hit, and Van, the provincial capital, have been hampered by power cuts and by more than 500 aftershocks, including one with a magnitude of 5.4 on Tuesday.

"MIRACLE" BABY

Emergency workers extracted the infant girl from the wreckage two days after she was buried with her mother under an apartment block.

The mother was clutching the child to her chest when they were reached by rescuers, who then set about rescuing the mother and a grandmother who were also still alive.

"We're going to get them out soon," a rescuer assured the other grandmother, whose eyes brimmed with tears of joy at the survival of her grandchild, who was born prematurely.

Elsewhere, exhausted workers used machinery, jackhammers, shovels, pick axes and bare hands to comb through rubble. Every so often, they would shout for silence and generators and diggers would stop, straining to hear voices under rubble. Seconds later the drone of the machinery would start again.

The Turkish Red Crescent said it is preparing temporary shelter for about 40,000 people, although there are no reliable figures for the homeless.

SLOW RESPONSE

Officials said 12,000 more tents would reach Van on Tuesday for the neediest, particularly in villages.

"Life has become hell. We are outside, the weather is cold. There are no tents," said Emin Kayram, 53, sitting by a campfire in Ercis after spending the night with his family of eight in a van parked nearby. His nephew was trapped in the debris of a building behind him, where rescue workers dug through the night.

"He is 18, a student. He is still stuck in there. This is the third day but you can't lose hope. We have to wait here."

How fast Ankara manages to deliver aid and long-term relief to the survivors might have political consequences in a region plagued by poverty and the Kurdish insurgency, analysts said.

Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, who won a third consecutive term with a strong majority in a June election, has promised to push reforms in parliament and rewrite the constitution to address long-time Kurdish grievances in an effort to end violence. Erdogan traveled to the region on Sunday, and President Abdullah Gul has also announced plans to visit.

"If we want to win the hearts of our brothers of Kurdish origin, we should act now. We should beat the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) with this approach, which is more effective than arms," leading analyst Mehmet Ali Birand wrote.

Fighting broke out among a crowd of around 200-300 people

after a truck arrived in Van city and started handing out tents next to a cemetery. Women were hit and kicked as people tried to force their way through to get access to the tents, while police tried in vain to establish order.

"There is absolutely no coordination, you have to step on people to get a tent," said jobless Suleyman Akbulut, 18.

"The prime minister runs for help when it's Palestine or Somalia, sends ships to Palestine, almost goes to war with Israel for the sake of Palestinians, but he doesn't move a muscle when it comes to his own people," said Emrullah, a young man of about 18.

(Additional reporting by Ece Toksabay; Writing by Ibon Villelabeitia, Daren Butler and Simon Cameron-Moore; Editing by Michael Roddy)

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Dozens die as quake rocks Turkey

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23 October 2011 Last updated at 22:27 GMT BBC reporter David O'Byrne: "There are people trapped under the rubble"

A strong quake has shattered buildings near the Turkish city of Van, killing at least 138 people and trapping an unknown number under rubble.

Casualties are reported to be particularly high in the town of Ercis, close to the Iranian border, where dozens of buildings fell.

Reports spoke of thousands of residents running screaming in the streets.

Fears rose of a death toll in the hundreds as rescuers worked into the night to find survivors.

Some were seen digging through rubble with shovels or their bare hands.

Turkey is particularly vulnerable to earthquakes because it sits on major geological fault lines.

Two earthquakes in 1999 with a magnitude of more than 7 killed almost 20,000 people in densely populated parts of the north-west of the country.

'One thousand buildings'

The earthquake struck at 13:41 (10:41 GMT) at a depth of 20km (12.4 miles), with its epicentre 16km north-east of Van in eastern Turkey, the US Geological Survey said.

It was followed by a series of powerful aftershocks, also centred north of Van, including two of magnitude 5.6 soon after the quake and one of 6.0 late on Sunday.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is visiting the Van region, said 138 people had been killed, 45 of them in the town of Ercis and 93 in Van.

He said about another 350 people had been injured, but other officials gave higher casualty figures.

Up to 80 buildings, including a dormitory, collapsed in the town about 60km north of Van, while 10 fell in Van itself.

Town mayor Zulfikar Arapoglu appealed for help. "We need urgent aid, we need medics," he said.

Ambulances, soldiers and rescue teams rushed to the town, a Reuters photographer reported from Ercis.

Survivors complained of a lack of heavy machinery to remove chunks of cement floors that had pancaked on to each other, the Associated Press reports.

Serious damage and casualties were also reported in the district of Celebibag, near Ercis.

"There are many people under the rubble," said the local mayor, Veysel Keser.

"People are in agony, we can hear their screams for help. We need urgent help."

The head of Turkey's seismology institute said hundreds of people could have been killed.

"We estimate around 1,000 buildings are damaged and our estimate is for hundreds of lives lost - it could be 500 or 1,000," said Mustafa Erdik, general manager of the Kandilli Observatory.

Night search

As evening fell, residents of Van and Ercis lit camp fires, preparing to spend the night outdoors.

Rescuers could be seen working by torchlight, using their hands and shovels.

Temperatures were expected to drop to near freezing overnight. The quake cut electricity and telephone lines and the authorities in some areas have cut gas to avoid the risk of fire.

The BBC's David O'Byrne, in Istanbul, said more search and rescue teams were being sent from other parts of the country.

Hakki Erskoy, from the Turkish Red Crescent, said aid teams from the north and east of Turkey were being sent to the earthquake-hit area.

He said camps were being set up to shelter people and blankets, food and water were being sent along with mobile kitchens.

Military aircraft were being deployed to help with the rescue and relief efforts, Mr Erskoy told BBC World News.

However, Turkey has rejected all offers of foreign assistance, a foreign ministry official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Reuters.

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Powerful quake rocks Bali island

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13 October 2011 Last updated at 09:43 GMT Tiles and bits of masonry fell off buildings in Bali as shaking continued for several minutes A strong earthquake has shaken the Indonesian island of Bali, injuring dozens of people and sending debris crashing into the streets.

The 6.1-magnitude earthquake struck before midday, with its epicentre about 100km (62 miles) to the south-west of Denpasar, Bali's capital.

It was felt across the island and as far away as Java and Lombok.

Reports said about 50 people were injured, mostly with cuts and broken bones caused by falling debris.

In the tourist resort of Kuta, hundreds of people ran into the streets as the earth shook for several minutes.

"There was panic - everyone ran out of the buildings," Endro Tjahjono of the Bali office of Indonesia's Meteorology and Geophysics Agency told AFP news agency.

"When we returned to our office building, we saw some cracks on the wall and plaster had come off the walls."

Several of those injured were students from a high school where the roof caved in, reports said.

Indonesia is located on the Pacific "Ring of Fire", an arc of volcanoes and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin.

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Checks of Washington Monument quake damage completed

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Civil engineers continue their work on the Washington Monument in Washington September 29, 2011.

Credit: Reuters/Hyungwon Kang

WASHINGTON | Thu Oct 6, 2011 4:38pm EDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The National Park Service and engineers have completed an assessment of earthquake damage to the now-closed Washington Monument, the agency said.

The service and an engineering team that rappelled the 555-foot-high obelisk wrapped up their checks on Wednesday, the National Park Service (NPS) said.

There is no schedule for reopening the site. The NPS has said the monument is structurally sound.

"The NPS is committed to restoring and reopening the Monument as quickly as possible in a manner that will make it safe for visitors," it said in a statement.

The monument sustained cracks more than an inch wide during the 5.8-magnitude temblor on August 23. Heavy rain from Hurricane Irene in late August worsened the damage.

The engineering team from Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates removed broken pieces that "ranged from golf-ball size to dictionary size," the statement said.

Some of the larger pieces could be pinned back on the monument during repairs.

Wiss, Janney, Elstner will ready a report on the damage and what repairs are needed and then carry out interim repairs. The NPS will determine how permanent repairs will be done.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson, editing by Ellen Wulfhorst)

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News : L'Aquila quake scientists in dock

  The earthquake devastated the city of L'Aquila and many surrounding villages The trial of six Italian scientists and a former government official for manslaughter over the 2009 earthquake in L'Aquila has opened in the city.
The 6.3 magnitude quake devastated the city and killed 309 people.
Prosecutors allege the defendants gave a falsely reassuring statement before the quake after studying hundreds of tremors that had shaken the city.
The defence argues that there is no way to predict major earthquakes even in a seismically active area.
The prosecutors accuse the seven of "negligence and imprudence... of having provided an approximate, generic and ineffective assessment of seismic activity risks as well as incomplete, imprecise and contradictory information".
As the trial opened, L'Aquila prosecutor Alfredo Rossini told reporters: "We simply want justice."
The defendants face up to 15 years in jail. Lawyers for civil plaintiffs - who include the local council - are seeking damages of 50m euros (£45m). The civil portion of the case will be heard alongside the criminal case.
Only one of the seven defendants - who include some of Italy's most distinguished geophysicists and members of the country's civil protection agency - was present on the opening day of the trial, which has now been adjourned until 1 October.
"I thought it was important to be here because this is my land, and I also wanted to underline the professionalism and the quality of the other public officials," said Bernardo De Bernardinis, former vice-president of the Civil Protection Agency's technical department.
"I am from Abruzzo and I owe it to the people of this area."
Killed in homes
The seven defendants were members of a government panel, the Serious Risks Commission, tasked with assessing the risks after hundreds of low-level tremors had rattled the medieval city in the months before the earthquake struck.
Continue reading the main story Franco Barberi, head of Serious Risks CommissionEnzo Boschi, former president of the National Institute of GeophysicsGiulio Selvaggi, director of the National Earthquake CentreGian Michele Calvi, director of European Centre for Earthquake EngineeringClaudio Eva, physicistMauro Dolce, director of the the Civil Protection Agency's earthquake risk officeBernardo De Bernardinis, former vice-president of the Civil Protection Agency's technical departmentA week before the quake, they issued a reassuring statement, while also saying that it was not possible to predict whether a stronger quake would occur. They also recommended stricter enforcement of anti-seismic measures, particularly in building construction.
In the minutes of their meeting, held on 31 March 2009, Mr Bosci, the former president of the National Institute of Geophysics, is reported to have told the group that just because a number of small tremors had been observed, it did not mean that a major earthquake was on its way.
Mr Barberi, who headed the Serious Risks Commission, was also reported as concluding that there was "no reason to believe that a series of low-level tremors was a precursor to a larger event".
On the night of the quake, many people remained in their homes and died because of this advice, while others who had decided to remain outside in the street survived, says the BBC's David Willey in Rome.
Vincenzo Vittorini, a doctor who founded the 309 Martyrs association after losing his wife and daughter in the disaster, said: "No-one expected to be told the exact time of the quake. We just wanted to be warned that we were sitting on a bomb."
The case has attracted the attention of the scientific community. Last year, more than 5,000 scientists signed an open letter to Italian President Giorgio Napolitano in support of the defendants.
A lawyer for Mr Eva, Alfredo Biondi, said the trial was not credible.
"This is a trial which opens on very shaky foundations. You cannot put science on trial," he said.

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India struggle over quake relief

20 September 2011 Last updated at 16:10 GMT Earthmovers are trying to clear debris in the Indian state of Sikkim
Rescue workers in the Indian state of Sikkim are struggling to reach victims of Sunday's powerful earthquake.
More than 80 people were killed, at least 50 of them in Sikkim.
Some 6,000 troops have been deployed in the north-eastern state to dig through mudslides and clear away rubble in an effort to reach cut-off villages.
Hundreds of people spent a second night in the open as aftershocks continued. The quake was felt elsewhere in India, as well as in Nepal, Tibet and Bhutan.
In the immediate aftermath of the quake heavy rains and landslides held up the relief effort. But a break in the poor weather meant that army helicopters were able to drop food supplies and transport medical teams to some affected areas.
Trapped under debris
Sikkim Chief Secretary Karma Gyatso told the BBC that rescue teams in the form of army personnel and a team of doctors had finally made it to the north of the state - the epicentre of the quake - where at least 33 people have died.
Continue reading the main story Suvojit Bagchi BBC Bengali on the Sikkim-Tibet border
As we arrived by Indian Air Force helicopter in the town of Chunthang - on Sikkim's northern border with Tibet - to deliver medical supplies, the hazards and pain of the last few days was etched on the faces of hundreds local people.
It was the first relief to be provided since the quake hit the area on Sunday.
Although hundreds receiving the supplies were desperate for food and medicine, they were still disciplined enough to form orderly queues.
People who had come to the town from local villages told me about homes being flattened, water being in short supply and food running out.
Local roads, they said, had been completely washed away as if they had been eaten up by the mountains.
Telephone contact with the outside world had disappeared. "It felt as as if we had been left to cope this tragedy by ourselves," a villager told me.
Mr Gyatso said that the number of dead was expected to "rise dramatically" because relief workers are yet to reach the inner parts of northern Sikkim where many people are feared to be trapped under debris.
"We have set up control rooms everywhere working alongside the army, the Indo Tibetan Police Force and the Sikkim police," Mr Gyatso said.
"We are trying to evacuate people stranded in inaccessible areas by helicopter, especially people in those areas where roads have been damaged."
Mr Gyatso said that with more than 100,000 homes in the state damaged, 2,500 relief camps had also been set up to provide people with some form of shelter.
Nevertheless, officials say the biggest challenge is reaching those villages in the most isolated areas of the mountainous state.
Convoys of vehicles left the state capital Gangtok on Tuesday morning but the AFP news agency says that progress was tortuously slow along precarious, badly-damaged roads.
Soldiers and emergency teams are using explosives to force their way through blocked highways as they try to reach remote villages.
On Tuesday, a break in the weather meant that helicopters were able to drop food and medical teams while evacuating some of the injured.
The earthquake triggered numerous landslides which crushed homes and blocked roads.
Continue reading the main story Became part of India in 1975Has a population of 500,000 peopleRenowned for its spectacular mountains and lakesEconomy largely dependent on tourism But troops and road workers managed to restore the main highway linking Sikkim with the rest of India.
But in the north of the state the situation remains uncertain.
"I've been here for six hours, waiting for the army to clear the road," Pema Doma, who was waiting for news of her parents and son in the Mangan area, told AFP.
"I'd walk if they would let me," Doma said. "The anxiety is killing me. What if he's screaming for me? What if he's calling for me and I can't even hear him?"
Tibet damage
Similar efforts were under way in Tibet and Nepal where homes have been destroyed as well.

The magnitude 6.9 quake struck the mountainous state of Sikkim at 18:10 (12:40 GMT) on Sunday, according to the US Geological Survey, and was followed by two strong aftershocks.
Several earthquakes hit the Himalayan region this year, but none caused major damage.
Just over the border in Tibet's Yadong County, just 40km (25 miles) from Sikkim, the earthquake caused hundreds of landslides, disrupting traffic, telecommunications, power and water supplies.
China's official Xinhua news agency said that seven people had died and 24 others had been injured in Tibet. Landslides have also disrupted power and water supplies.
Nepal's government said 11 people had died, including two men and a child who were killed when a wall of the British embassy collapsed in the capital, Kathmandu.

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Hero quake pig 'cloned in China'

  Hero pig Zhu Jianqiang "surprised us again" said scientists Chinese scientists have cloned a pig which was hailed a hero in 2008 after surviving more than a month under earthquake rubble, a newspaper reports.Six piglets have been produced with DNA identical to Zhu Jiangqiang, or "Strong-Willed Pig", the Hong Kong-based Sunday Morning Post says.
The cloning project was a success even though Zhu is castrated and is five years old (60 years in human age).
Zhu survived the 8.0 magnitude quake that rocked Sichuan province in 2008.
More than 90,000 people died or went missing in what was considered in China to be the worst natural disaster in a generation.
The 330-pound (150kg) Zhu is thought to have survived in the ruins of his sty by chewing charcoal and drinking rainwater, the AFP news agency reports.
He is said to have suffered severe trauma from being buried under rubble for 36 days.
"The wonderful pig surprised us again," Du Yutao, the head of the cloning project, told the Sunday Morning Post.
The newspaper says the piglets bear a striking resemblance to their dad - with a birthmark between their eyes.
They are likely to be paired off and sent to a museum and a genetic institute, the paper reports.

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