Ali Kafadenk, 34, in front of the rubble of his destroyed apartment in Islahiye, Turkey. He and his wife Merve, 27, survived the earthquake that hit Turkey and Syria on February 6.
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Ali Kafadenk, 34, in front of the rubble of his destroyed apartment in Islahiye, Turkey. He and his wife Merve, 27, survived the earthquake that hit Turkey and Syria on February 6.
Daniel Estrin/NPR
ISLAHIYE, Turkey — Ali and Merve Kafadenk were sleeping in their beds when their six-story apartment building began to shake.
It was just after 4 a.m. on Feb. 6. Merve poked Ali and woke him up. There was an earthquake, she said. It will pass, he replied.
Then, two opposite bedroom walls are recessed, forming a concrete tent over their bed. It was so low that they couldn’t sit up.
“We were trapped under the walls… there was an upside-down V. That’s what protected us,” Ali Kafadenk said.
The earthquake disaster claimed the lives of more than 43,000 people in Turkey and Syria, AP news agency reported late Friday. Kafadenks’ The town of Islahiye was hit hard. Of the dozens of people living in his 18-unit apartment building, only two others survived, he said.
Here’s what their building looked like before the earthquake:
How some survived under the rubble
A slanted wall that creates a small niche is one way some lucky people survived the rubble following last week’s earthquake and major aftershocks.
Some people happen to find themselves trapped underneath a wall that falls onto a bed or other object, creating a small triangle of protection for them.
“They have space to live,” said Osman Turk, a response specialist with Turkey’s National Medical Rescue Team that coordinates the taxonomic units that help survivors be pulled out of the wreckage.
Osman Turk is an emergency response specialist from Turkey’s National Medical Rescue Team. He coordinated first aid teams for earthquake survivors to be pulled from the rubble.
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Osman Turk is an emergency response specialist from Turkey’s National Medical Rescue Team. He coordinated first aid teams for earthquake survivors to be pulled from the rubble.
Daniel Estrin/NPR
In one case, he said, a wall fell on a refrigerator, giving a 7-year-old girl some protective space — and food — to survive for four days before being rescued.
For those who survived days under the rubble, the cold weather also helped because survivors didn’t sweat as much, helping to delay dehydration, doctors say.
They think they will die
Ali Kafadenk, 34, and his wife Merve, 27, were only trapped under the rubble for about an hour and a half but thought they were going to die.
“That’s the only option, we think,” Ali Kafadenk said. “Like, at any moment, something’s going to come crashing down on us and this will be the end.”
He covered his wife with a blanket and threw himself on top of her to protect her. They cried together, and prayed together. “We say to each other that we come from God. We will return to God,” he said.
Supernatural sound
He heard his building sink and the earth move. It was a sound he had never heard in his life: strong and loud, like a deep thunder.
“It sounded like a supernatural sound,” he said. “Like the sound we hear in sci-fi movies.”
The building was moved and dilapidated. Three floors above their apartment spill out onto the street.
Then somehow a hole formed in the wall. It was too dusty to see anything, but he felt it: snow, cold air. That’s when he heard the neighbors screaming: My child is stuck here. My foot is stuck there. My mother is down here. My dad is over there.
Ali Kafadenk (left) and his brother Abdullah look at the ruins of Ali’s apartment building in Islahiye, Turkey. The building was reduced to rubble during the February 6 earthquake that hit Turkey and Syria.
Daniel Estrin
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Ali Kafadenk (left) and his brother Abdullah look at the ruins of Ali’s apartment building in Islahiye, Turkey. The building was reduced to rubble during the February 6 earthquake that hit Turkey and Syria.
Daniel Estrin
So Ali and Merve Kafadenk also shouted and someone came to pull them out. Ali was barefoot, and another man handed him a pair of shoes.
“He said, ‘I have seven kids stuck under the rubble over there. I just heard from you so I tried to help you. So I came for you. But now I need to go. deal with your children'”. Ali recalled.
His home in Islahiye is about half a mile from the fault line, because mapping by the United States Geological Survey.
First time visiting the ruins
Nine days after the earthquake, Kafadenk returned to the disaster area with his brother to retrieve the registration papers from his buried car to make an insurance claim. This is the first time he has returned to his dilapidated house.
“Watching it, it felt like I was reliving all of that. I felt fear, sadness and loss,” he said.
Merve teaches kindergarten, and he teaches first through fourth grade. They tried to call their colleagues but failed to reach them. He thought they were dead.
One of the few things he was able to recover from the building was letters of appreciation from his students. He wondered how many of them survived.
A few days later, the good news came: After years of trying, he was finally accepted to teach at a school that paid three times his salary.
“I can’t call this a miracle,” said his brother, Abdullah Kafadenk.
Ali and Merve Kafadenk’s ramshackle bed frame rests on the ruins of their demolished apartment in Islahiye, Turkey. When the earthquake hit on February 6, the bedroom walls collapsed, forming a concrete tent over their bed and protecting them.
Daniel Estrin/NPR
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Ali and Merve Kafadenk’s ramshackle bed frame rests on the ruins of their demolished apartment in Islahiye, Turkey. When the earthquake hit on February 6, the bedroom walls collapsed, forming a concrete tent over their bed and protecting them.
Daniel Estrin/NPR
