Death toll from earthquake in Turkey and Syria past 5,000, casualties could exceed 20,000

Death toll from the devastating earthquake that occurred in Turkey and Syria on Monday has risen to over 5,000. 

Rescuers struggled to dig people out of the rubble of collapsed buildings on Tuesday in a "race against time."

On Monday, a deadly earthquake of magnitude 7.8, hit Turkey  and neighbouring Syria - the deadliest in Turkey since 1999. A second earthquake followed hours later.

Thousands of buildings were toppled, hospitals and schools wrecked and tens of thousands of people were injured or left homeless in several Turkish and Syrian cities.

A U.N. official said thousands of children may be among the dead.

In Turkey, the death toll had climbed to 3,419 people by Tuesday morning, Vice President Fuat Oktay said. In Syria, the death toll stood at just over 1,600, according to the government and a rescue service in the insurgent-held northwest.

Turkish authorities say some 13.5 million people were affected in an area spanning roughly 450 km from Adana in the west to Diyarbakir in the east, and 300 km from Malatya in the north to Hatay in the south. Syrian authorities have reported deaths as far south as Hama, some 100 km from the epicentre.

"It's now a race against time," World Health Organization Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in Geneva. "Every minute, every hour that passes, the chances of finding survivors alive diminishes."

Nearly 8,000 people have been rescued from 4,758 buildings destroyed in the tremors a day earlier, Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) said in its latest statement.

The earthquake, which was followed by a series of aftershocks, was the biggest recorded worldwide by the U.S. Geological Survey since a tremor in the remote South Atlantic in August 2021.

It was the deadliest earthquake in Turkey since a quake of similar magnitude in 1999 that killed more than 17,000. Nearly 16,000 were reported injured in Monday’s quake.