Ali Kafadenk, 34, poses in entrance of the rubble of his destroyed condominium in Islahiye, Turkey. He and his spouse Merve, 27, survived the earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria on Feb 6.

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Ali Kafadenk, 34, poses in entrance of the rubble of his destroyed condominium in Islahiye, Turkey. He and his spouse Merve, 27, survived the earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria on Feb 6.

Daniel Estrin/NPR

ISLAHIYE, Turkey — Ali and Merve Kafadenk have been sleeping in mattress when their six-story condominium constructing began to shake.

It was a bit after 4 a.m. on Feb. 6. Merve poked Ali and woke him up. There’s an earthquake, she mentioned. It’ll cross, he replied.

Then, two reverse bed room partitions caved in, forming a concrete tent over their mattress. It was so low they could not sit up.

“We were stuck under the walls … with a shape of an upside-down V. That’s what protected us,” Ali Kafadenk says.

The catastrophic earthquake has killed greater than 43,000 folks in Turkey and Syria, The Associated Press reported late Friday. The Kafadenks’ city of Islahiye was hard-hit. Out of the handfuls who lived in his 18-unit condominium constructing, solely two others escaped alive, he says.

Here’s what their constructing regarded like earlier than the quake:

How some stayed alive beneath the rubble

A tipped wall making a small cavity is a method a number of fortunate folks managed to remain alive beneath the rubble after final week’s huge earthquake and aftershocks.

Some discovered themselves, by likelihood, trapped beneath a wall that fell over onto a mattress or one other object, making a small triangle that protected them.

“They have a space to live,” says Osman Turk, a response specialist on Turkey’s National Medical Rescue Team coordinating triage items that assist survivors pulled out of the rubble.

Osman Turk is an emergency response specialist from Turkey’s National Medical Rescue Team. He has been coordinating the groups giving first help to earthquake survivors faraway from the rubble.

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Osman Turk is an emergency response specialist from Turkey’s National Medical Rescue Team. He has been coordinating the groups giving first help to earthquake survivors faraway from the rubble.

Daniel Estrin/NPR

In one case, he says, a wall fell onto a fridge, giving a 7-year-old woman a protecting house — and meals — to outlive for 4 days earlier than she was rescued.

For those that survived for days beneath the rubble, the chilly climate additionally helped, medics say, as a result of survivors did not sweat a lot, delaying dehydration.

They thought they’d die

Ali Kafadenk, 34, and his spouse Merve, 27, have been solely trapped beneath the rubble for about an hour and a half, however thought they have been going to die.

“That was the only option, we thought,” Ali Kafadenk says. “Like, any minute, there’s going to be something that’s going to come crashing down on our heads and this is going to be the end.”

He lined his spouse with the bedcovers, and threw himself over her to guard her. They cried collectively, and prayed collectively. “We were saying to each other that we came from God. We will go back to God,” he says.

A supernatural sound

He heard his constructing sink and the earth transfer. It was a sound he had by no means heard earlier than in his life: robust and loud, like low thunder.

“It feels like it’s a supernatural sound,” he says. “Like the sound that we hear in sci-fi movies.”

The constructing shifted and crumbled. The three flooring above their condominium fell into the road.

Then by some means a gap fashioned within the wall. It was too dusty to see something, however he felt it: snowy, chilly air. That is when he heard his neighbors’ screams: My child’s caught right here. My leg is caught there. My mother’s beneath right here. My dad’s over there.

Ali Kafadenk (left) and his brother Abdullah take a look at the rubble of Ali’s condominium constructing in Islahiye, Turkey. The constructing was diminished to rubble within the Feb. 6 earthquake that hit Turkey and Syria.

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Daniel Estrin

Ali Kafadenk (left) and his brother Abdullah take a look at the rubble of Ali’s condominium constructing in Islahiye, Turkey. The constructing was diminished to rubble within the Feb. 6 earthquake that hit Turkey and Syria.

Daniel Estrin

So Ali and Merve Kafadenk additionally shouted, and somebody got here to drag them out. Ali was barefoot, and one other man gave him a pair of sneakers.

“He said, ‘I have seven children who are stuck under the rubble over there. I just heard you, so I tried to help you. So I came for you. But now I need to go and deal with my children,'” Ali remembers.

His dwelling in Islahiye was about half a mile from the estimated fault line, as mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey.

Visiting the rubble for the primary time

Nine days after the quake, Kafadenk is again within the catastrophe zone along with his brother to retrieve the registration papers from his buried automotive for an insurance coverage declare. It’s the primary time he is returned to the ruins of his dwelling.

“Seeing it, it feels like I’m living through all of it again. I’m feeling fear, sadness and loss,” he says.

Merve teaches kindergarten, and he teaches first by means of fourth grade. They’ve tried calling their colleagues however cannot attain them. He thinks they’ve died.

One of the few issues he might get well from the constructing have been letters of appreciation from his college students. He wonders what number of of them survived.

Good information comes just a few days later: After years of making an attempt, he lastly bought accepted to show in a college that pays about triple the wage he used to make.

“I cannot call this more than a miracle,” says his brother, Abdullah Kafadenk.

Ali and Merve Kafadenk’s mangled mattress body sits atop the rubble of their destroyed condominium in Islahiye, Turkey. When the earthquake hit Feb. 6, the bed room partitions caved in, forming a concrete tent over their mattress and defending them.

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Ali and Merve Kafadenk’s mangled mattress body sits atop the rubble of their destroyed condominium in Islahiye, Turkey. When the earthquake hit Feb. 6, the bed room partitions caved in, forming a concrete tent over their mattress and defending them.

Daniel Estrin/NPR