More than 4,000 people killed so far due to deadly earthquakes in Turkey and Syria, reports The Associated Press

Ankara,

Gaziantep is a small industrial city located in southeastern Turkey near the border with Syria.

A powerful earthquake occurred here yesterday morning.

The earthquake, which struck at 4.17 am local time, registered a magnitude of 7.8 on the Richter scale.

And it is 20 km underground. The US Geological Survey reported that it was centered at depth.

The first major earthquake was followed by about 20 more severe aftershocks.

The earthquake, centered in the city of Gaziantep, was strongly felt across Turkey. Especially 10 provinces located in the south-eastern part of the country were shaken by the earthquake.

It was early morning and most of the people were fast asleep. Hundreds of lives were lost as buildings collapsed before they woke up to the tremors.

During the earthquake, hundreds of buildings, including residential buildings, commercial complexes with apartments, in the cities of Gaziantep, Kahramanmaras, Diyarbakir, Adana, Malatya, Kilis, etc. collapsed in an instant like a deck of cards.

More than 1,500 buildings were reported to have collapsed. As a result, all the directions turned there are architecturally spectacular.

Thousands of rescue teams have been deployed to rescue hundreds of people trapped in the piles of building debris, and rescue operations have been accelerated. The public along with them are busy removing the debris with their bare hands and rescuing the trapped people.

Among the demolished buildings in Turkey are hospitals. This has made it difficult to provide immediate high-quality treatment to those who have been rescued. Apart from that, the snowfall and rain in the earthquake-affected areas has hampered the rescue operations.

In the meantime, this earthquake also caused a lot of damage in Syria. The northern parts of Syria bordering Turkey were destabilized by the earthquake. There, many towns held by rebels and government forces were destroyed.

The Zandaris, which are held by the rebels, have been particularly badly affected. Hundreds of buildings, including those that had already been destroyed by bombings during the civil war, were razed to the ground.

The government-held cities of Aleppo, Latakia, Hama and Tartus were also hit hard. There, the streets are littered with rubble and corpses. Rescue teams have been deployed to search for survivors amid the massive rubble.

More than 4,000 people are reported to have died in the earthquake in Turkey and Syria so far. More than 15,000 people who were trapped in the rubble due to the earthquake have been rescued and are being treated.