The aftershocks came again and again, but the owner of the house gently told us every time, rest assured, the house will not collapse..."We all believed it, and I spent the longest night of my life."
The full text is 4114 words and takes about 8 minutes to read
▲On February 9, 2023, local time, Hatai, Turkey, rescue work is underway after the earthquake Photo/IC photo
Beijing News reporter Xu Xuefei Editor Chen Xiaoshu Proofreader Li Lijun
On the night they fled from the earthquake zone, Lin Jie's family drove on the road with constant aftershocks, torrential rain and hail hitting the roof of the car. The only thing on their bodies that could be called clean and warm was the ill-fitting socks that Lin Jie snatched from the store.
A native of Guangxi, China, Lin Jie and her Turkish boyfriend started a multinational family in 2016 and settled in Antakya, the capital of Turkey's Hatay province.
At 4:17 a.m. local time on February 6, 2023, a 7.8-magnitude earthquake occurred in Turkey with a focal depth of 20 kilometers. The earthquake was extremely destructive and widespread, and Hatay province was one of the epicenter areas.
24 hours after the earthquake, in the midst of heavy rain, aftershocks, lack of water and food, Lin Jie suddenly understood that they could only save themselves and had to leave the home that had collapsed for seven years. They fled Antakya in Hatay province.
The following is Lin Jie's self-statement.
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The whole building was like someone had cut it
On the evening of February 5th, to celebrate the start of school the next day for my six-year-old son, we bought cake and threw a small house party for him. As a mom, I was so excited about my child's start of school, I drank so many drinks that I didn't fall asleep until late.
At 4:17 a.m., a big earthquake came. Our family lives on the fourth floor, and at first the house shook slightly, but after about 10 seconds the house began to shake violently, and I quickly woke up my husband and son.
I said earthquake. My husband picked up his son and wanted to run outside. I said, "Clothes! Must be dressed! Because it had been raining since February 5, and my son was wearing only a pair of underwear. So my husband put blankets over us.
The house was still shaking violently at this time, and the three of us crouched next to the sofa in the living room, hugging each other tightly. After a few seconds, the shaking stopped, and we tried to run downstairs when we got dressed, but the door frame was deformed and the door couldn't be opened from the inside. My husband dragged us to the balcony again, but the balcony door couldn't be opened, and we had to break the window.
At this time, the house can no longer see the floor, the second floor, the third floor, and the fourth floor of the balcony are all connected, the only luck is that a passage is left from the gap in the balcony. In this way, two of us, adults and a child, touched the wall that had exposed bricks and steel bars in the rainstorm, and finally walked to the ground step by step.
It wasn't until dawn that I saw that the whole building looked like someone had been cut, and the second half of my living room was folded.
▲Antakya, Hatayi Province, Turkey, the apartment building of Lin Jie's family. Photo courtesy of interviewee
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"I'm really afraid I won't find you guys tonight"
Earthquakes seem to distort our ability to sense time, and in retrospect, we did so much at the time, but it was only a few minutes before the earthquake when we were safely on the ground. After coming out, the Antakya network and signal were cut off, and we tried to call our relatives but couldn't get through.
At about 4:30 a.m. on February 6, we walked to a square with our neighbors. My husband told me he was going to his parents and let me stay here with my son. I said no, we have to be together as a family of three. So the three of us braved the rain to walk in the direction of my parents-in-law's house, and the road that usually took a few minutes was now full of ruins and bricks. We didn't have an umbrella, holding hands, speechless all the way.
When they arrived downstairs at the parents-in-law, their houses were still fine, but the whereabouts of the people were unknown, and the car was gone.
So we followed the crowd to a place where we could take shelter from the rain, a place where prayers were held every Friday. But now, the people in the house are covered with blankets and hugging together. A kind person saw our child drenched and gave him a clean set of children's clothes.
The temperature outside was around zero degrees Celsius, and we were already feeling bone-cold because we were drenched. As soon as I undressed my son, he cried and said mom I was too cold. The neighbors saw us too pitiful and invited us to go to the blanket for warmth, and we let the children go. My husband and I didn't go because we were still wet.
Around five o'clock in the morning, communication in Antakya briefly resumed, and my husband finally got on the phone with his parents, and as soon as the phone called, he cried. After reporting safety and location to each other, my husband said that the three of us would go now. I said no, it's still dark, it's raining outside, there are aftershocks at any time, wait until after dawn.
But what I didn't expect was that my father-in-law hung up the phone and came to us with an umbrella in the dark. Ten minutes later, he arrived, hugged my husband and cried, "I finally see you, I'm really afraid I won't find you tonight."
After that, one after another, we talked to our brothers, sisters, relatives and friends who could be contacted by phone and reported safety. I made two phone calls, the first to my brother in China, the second to the Chinese Embassy in Turkey, and I said, "The earthquake happened, my home was destroyed, but I was not injured, and my family is with me." ”
Four hours after the earthquake, people called relatives in the rain. Photo courtesy of interviewee
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People who have no choice but to grab supplies
At eight o'clock in the morning of February 6, the sky finally dawned. The relatives and brothers and sisters connected in the family all drove to our collapsed apartment building. For three hours, we hadn't reached my husband's grandparents, who lived on the second floor downstairs from us.
When I arrived, my husband and the men of both families climbed into the ruins. It was really fortunate that although the building collapsed, a floor slab was supported by the car at the door, and the grandparents were in this gap, and a grandmother from a neighbor was also here and rescued together. In this way, we found everyone in the family, and everyone was safe and sound! Not only that, but they also picked up my phone and some of my son's clothes from the rubble.
At nine o'clock on February 6, we decided to leave Antakya. But before leaving, we have to solve several problems - water, food and gasoline.
We first looked for three gas stations, all of which were unable to refuel because of the power outage, and the remaining gasoline in the car did not guarantee that we would be able to get out of Antakya. I said, "Don't think about oil, so many adults and children, without water and food, definitely not, we have to solve this first." ”
▲ After the earthquake, people took quilts and clothes from collapsed houses. Photo courtesy of interviewee
There was a supermarket next to the third gas station that was not damaged in the earthquake, but the windows had been broken. When we entered, we found that the shelves where we usually put clothes and quilts had been emptied. Coming out of the supermarket, a kind person told us that there was a supermarket still open to the north. When we went, there were no more clothes, quilts, food and water in the supermarket, and there were many people fighting around a shelf for things. I looked down at my soaked shoes and saw that my feet were frozen to the point of unconsciousness, and I remembered that our family had not had time to put on socks.
So I also rushed into the crowd and grabbed a few pairs of socks.
At that time, my son thought of his collapsed home, and he cried, saying, "Mom, I'm afraid", I was so cruel at that time, I said to him, "You are not allowed to cry first, because tears are water, and we have no water now."
At ten o'clock on February 6, the aftershocks continued, and my husband found water. He returned with a worn-out washbasin containing a dozen bottles of mineral water. I was very happy and said that you were amazing, but he said to me with a sad face, "I'm sorry, there is still a lot of water there, but I am afraid that I dare not go back and get more."
Later, we drove past the place where my husband found water, which was a small supermarket that had completely collapsed, and I couldn't imagine how he climbed in, how he found a broken basin, and how he brought out these dozen bottles of water. I think if I had been with my husband, I wouldn't have let him in anyway.
▲Turkey, a hospital that collapsed after an earthquake. Photo courtesy of interviewee
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The longest night of my life
At noon on 6 February, the rain stopped and the sun finally shone into Antakya, and although the aftershocks continued, the magnitude was clearly getting smaller, and some people said that "the earthquake may have passed". We also became optimistic, after all, the house of the in-laws is still there, maybe we can spend the night at the in-laws' house.
The parents-in-law decided to go back to their house and bring everyone some food. Five minutes later, they came out with bread and clothes. He said it was everything they could get as fast as they could. So we had bread and water, which was unimaginably lucky in Antakya.
At one o'clock in the afternoon, it began to rain again in Antakya, and there was another discussion about whether there would be another major earthquake. At this time, not a rescue team has been seen in Antakya. No one knows how long the power and water cuts in Antakya will last, and we have to help ourselves and have to evacuate from here.
At 1:24 p.m., the car was driving on the road to the north, and the heavy rain and hail hit the roof of the car together, and we felt a second strong earthquake.
At 11 p.m. on February 6, we arrived in a rural village in Hatay province, where a relative of my husband built a bungalow according to earthquake-proof standards. He said, "Don't worry, my house won't collapse." So we finally had a shelter from the rain and a place to sit and drink hot water.
After eating, we lay on the floor when the aftershocks came again. The owner of the house was very calm, he said: "Close your eyes and sleep peacefully." I listened to his words and closed my eyes, obviously my body was extremely tired, but all my senses were open—I listened to the sound of the rainstorm hitting the windows outside, the alarm of the car, and felt the slight shaking of the ground.
The night was so long, the aftershocks came again and again, but the owner of the house gently told us every time, rest assured that the house would not collapse. It's strange, obviously our houses have collapsed, and even my in-laws' house heard that there was a crack in the second strong earthquake, but he said: "Don't worry, it won't collapse." "We all believed it, and just like that, I had the longest night of my life.
▲On February 9, 2023, local time, Idlib, Syria, a strong earthquake occurred on February 6 in southern Turkey near the Syrian border, causing heavy casualties in Turkey and Syria. A survivor spends the night outdoors. Photo/IC photo
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Escape from Hatay
At eight o'clock in the morning on February 7, dawn and the rain stopped. We decided to drive to south-central Turkey to our relatives in Karaman province. On the way, we saw that not only the glass of clothing stores and supermarkets was broken, but also the glass of pharmacies. Later, I heard that many people who survived the earthquake had been feverish since last night because of the rain.
At eleven o'clock in the morning, we arrived in Karaman. Everyone's tense nerves seemed to finally relax, and we began to learn the full picture of the earthquake from the news: collapsed houses, nearly ten disaster areas, rising deaths, and the difficulty of rescue almost sky-high.
▲On February 7, 2023 local time, Lin Jie's family continued to drive and left Hatay Province. Photo courtesy of interviewee
On the afternoon of February 7, Chinese groups in Turkey spontaneously donated money for me, funded me, and some even transferred money directly to me.
On February 8, Ms. Yang, who lives an hour's drive from Karaman province, contacted me with Professor Zhu and drove me to bring me a lot of much-needed supplies. I could clearly feel that after they came to visit me, my family's mood visibly improved. I really thank them very much.
The owner of the house we are currently living in spontaneously went to Hatay province to rescue after hearing about the earthquake on 6 February. When he returned on the afternoon of 8 February, we asked him, "What happened to Hatay, has anyone from the government gone in Antakia, Hatayi province?" Shaking his head, he said that when he evacuated over there, only a rescue team from China arrived.
▲At 7:30 p.m. local time on February 9, 2023, Syria, the Red Cross Society of China sent the first batch of medical supplies to Syria to arrive at Damascus International Airport. Workers are unloading medical supplies. Photo by Beijing News reporter Tao Ran
In fact, I know that our family is still together, and I am lucky enough to be in such a disaster. A lot of people comforted us and told me "it's good to be alive, it's good to be alive," but I really couldn't be happy with my current situation.
(Lin Jie is a pseudonym)
Duty Editor Li Plus Minus Kang Heehee