Search on for missing after Turkey quake

Rescue teams worked into the night yesterday, seeking survivors of an earthquake that killed at least 10 people, toppled buildings and sowed panic less than three weeks after a massive deadly quake in the same area.

Television footage showed the injured being treated at tents as the private CNN-Turk television reported that most of the hospitals damaged during the quake were emptied.

Ten people, including a Japanese humanitarian worker, lost their lives during the quake which struck late on Wednesday and at least 27 people were pulled out alive, according to the Prime Minister’s disaster and emergency management centre.

More than 800 rescue personnel rushed to the area, with mechanical diggers clawing through rubble after the 5.6 magnitude quake struck near the city of Van, which sent two hotels crashing down along with two dozen mostly empty buildings.

Among the 27 people recovered from the rubble were two members of a Japanese humanitarian association who had arrived in the area to help after a 7.2 magnitude quake struck on October 23, killing more than 600 people and injuring more than 4,150.

But one of the Japanese men later died of his injuries, according to the Anatolia news agency, bringing the death toll from the latest quake to ten.

It was not clear how many people remained trapped under the rubble.

“When I came out there was nothing but a cloud of smoke everywhere,” said Recep Ozhan, a receptionist at one of the two collapsed hotels, one of them a six-storey building in Van city centre that housed mostly journalists and teams from the Turkish Red Crescent.

“There were 32 clients registered at the hotel yesterday, but I don’t know how many were inside the building... I don’t know if anyone was able to get out besides me,” he said.

Aslan Bayram, owner of one of the collapsed hotels Bayram Hotel – one of the oldest in the city – said through the media that his property was examined by experts after last month’s quake and authorities gave it the all-clear. But televisions aired a video showing the inner side of the hotel after the earlier quake with deep cracks on the walls.

Turkish authorities, heavily criticised at home for a sluggish response to the October quake, said they rushed nine planes carrying almost 300 rescuers to the region overnight on Wednesday along with 50 ambulances and 250 medical personnel.

“What is comforting is that 23 out of 25 buildings (that collapsed) were already empty,” Vice Prime Minister Besir Atalay told journalists as he toured the area.

“There were people only in the two hotels and that is where the work is currently going on,” Anatolia quoted him as saying.

He declined to give a figure on how many people had been in the two hotels.

“There are contradictory figures,” Mr Atalay said. “The hotel owners gave us one set of figures, but security cameras showed that a number of people had left” the buildings.

As rescuers picked through the rubble on the ground, 23 planes and eight medical helicopters were ferrying material and personnel to and from the area, where snow is forecast today.