Thousands are dead, and the death toll is expected to keep rising after two massive earthquakes struck Turkey on Monday, Feb. 6.
As The New York Times reports, the first earthquake hit at 4:17 a.m. local time, in Gaziantep in southern Turkey, not far from the Syrian border (the quake was also felt in Syria, Cyprus, Egypt, Israel, and Lebanon). About nine hours later, a second earthquake hit the same region, about 59 miles north of the original.
As of publication, at least 2,100 people were dead in Turkey and Syria, and 3,000 buildings have reportedly collapsed in Turkey. The initial quake is the deadliest Turkey has seen in over 20 years and about as strong as the most powerful quake ever recorded in the country’s history in 1939.
The first quake registered a magnitude of 7.8, while the second aftershock measured 7.5. Though Turkey is regularly rattled by earthquakes, including ones with magnitudes of 7.0 or more, these caused such significant damage because the epicenter of the quake was so shallow (about 10 miles deep) and because the Gazianstep region is so densely populated. Gaziantep’s population is about two million people, while the region is also home to hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees at a nearby United Nations operation.
Numerous other factors are contributing to the severity of the crisis, from immediate concerns about inclemate weather to longstanding economic and societal issues. To start, the quake has coincided with near-freezing temperatures and a looming winter storm that’s expected to bring both heavy rain and snow.
“Hundreds of thousands of people are impacted by this. It is cold. It is rainy. Roads could be impacted, that means your food, your livelihood, the care for your children, the care for your family,” meteorologist Karen Maginnis said on CNN. “Anything as far as crops or anything growing across this region will be impacted as well. The ramifications of this are broad and will impact this region for weeks, and months.”
Additionally, southern Turkey and northern Syria have faced significant economic hardship in recent years, and an early estimate placed the damage from Monday’s quakes at over $1 billion. Turkey’s currency, the lira, is collapsing amid rising inflation as the country’s economy slows and wages remain low.
And Syria remains gripped by civil war, with the earthquake hitting a particularly fraught region in the northwest part of the country, near the front line between government and anti-government forces. Years of airstrikes had already weakened or destroyed much of the infrastructure in the area before Monday’s quakes hit.
“Anywhere else in the world, this would be an emergency,” Mark Kaye, spokesman for the International Rescue Committee, told The Times. “What we have in Syria is an emergency within an emergency.”