Diyarbakir (Turkey) (AFP) - A major earthquake struck Turkey and Syria on Monday, killing more than 2,600 people and flattening thousands of buildings as rescuers dug with bare hands for survivors.
Dozens of nations have pledged aid since the 7.8-magnitude quake, which hit as people were still sleeping and amid freezing weather that has hampered emergency efforts.
Multi-storey apartment buildings full of residents were among the 3,400 structures reduced to rubble in Turkey, while Syria announced dozens of collapses, as well as damage to archaeological sites in Aleppo.
"We managed to save three people, but two were dead," said Halis Aktemur, 35, in Turkey's southeastern city of Diyarbakir after the quake that was felt as far away as Greenland.
The initial quake was followed by dozens of aftershocks, including a 7.5-magnitude tremor that jolted the region in the middle of search and rescue work on Monday.
"I can't go anywhere.I am thinking they will need my help again," he said, referring to the sizeable aftershocks that left people terrified to return indoors.
The head of Syria's National Earthquake Centre, Raed Ahmed, called it "the biggest earthquake recorded in the history of the centre".
Turkey declared seven days of mourning for the dead.
At least 1,000 people died across Syria, the government and rescuers said.
'Apocalypse'
Turkish government officials reported another 1,651 fatalities, putting the combined total at 2,651.
"That was the first time we have ever experienced anything like that," said Melisa Salman, a 23-year-old reported in the southeastern Turkish city of Kahramanmaras."We thought it was the apocalypse."
The rescue was being hampered by a winter blizzard that covered major roads in ice and snow.Officials said the earthquake made three major airports in the area inoperable, further complicating deliveries of vital aid.
Turkey's last 7.8-magnitude tremor was in 1939, when 33,000 died in the eastern Erzincan province.
Monday's first earthquake struck at 4:17am (0117 GMT) at a depth of about 18 kilometres (11 miles) near the Turkish city of Gaziantep, which is home to around two million people, the US Geological Survey said.
Denmark's geological institute said tremors reached the east coast of Greenland about eight minutes after the main quake struck Turkey.
Osama Abdel Hamid, a quake survivor in Syria, said his family was sleeping when the shaking began.
"The walls collapsed over us, but my son was able to get out," he said.
'People under debris'
"He started screaming and people gathered around, knowing there were survivors, and they pulled us out from under the rubble."
Over 150 injured people arrived by mid-morning at a hospital in the area, where general surgeon Majid Ibrahim said he expected others.
"A lot of people are still under the debris of the buildings," he told AFP. "We need urgent help for the area, especially medical help."
The United States, the European Union and Russia all immediately sent condolences and offers of help.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky offered to provide "the necessary assistance" to Turkey, whose combat drones are helping Kyiv fight the Russian invasion.
Images on Turkish television showed rescuers digging through rubble across neighbourhoods of almost all the big cities running along the border with Syria.
Some of the heaviest devastation occurred near the quake's epicentre between Kahramanmaras and Gaziantep, where entire city blocks lay in ruins under gathering snow.
A famous mosque dating back to the 13th century partially collapsed in the province of Maltaya, along with a 14-story building with 28 apartments that housed 92 people.
In other cities, social media posts showed a 2,200-year-old hilltop castle built by Roman armies in Gaziantep lying in ruins, its walls partially turned to rubble.
Power outages
"We hear voices here -- and over there, too," one rescuer was overheard as saying on NTV television in front of a flattened building in the city of Diyarbakir.
"There may be 200 people under the rubble."
The Syrian health ministry reported damage across the provinces of Aleppo, Latakia, Hama and Tartus, where Russia is leasing a naval facility.
AFP correspondents in northern Syria said terrified residents ran out of their homes after the ground shook.
Even before the tragedy, buildings in Aleppo -- Syria's pre-war commercial hub -- often collapsed due to the dilapidated infrastructure, which has suffered from lack of war-time oversight.
Officials cut off natural gas and power supplies across the region as a precaution, also closing schools for two weeks.
Turkey is in one of the world's most active earthquake zones.
The Turkish region of Duzce suffered a 7.4-magnitude earthquake in 1999, when more than 17,000 people died -- including about 1,000 in Istanbul.
Experts have long warned a large quake could devastate Istanbul, a megalopolis of 16 million people filled with rickety homes.
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