There is now little hope of finding survivors of the rubble eleven days after the earthquakes that struck Turkey and Syria. However, a 17-year-old girl was rescued on Thursday, an AFP journalist found. Aleyna Ölmez - whose surname in Turkish means "she who does not die" - is one of the few survivors still discovered under the rubble despite the cold and violence of the February 6 tremor that killed more than 36,000 people in Turkey.
The girl had been buried under the rubble of her apartment building in Kahramanmaras, southern Turkey, for 248 hours. At the time of the rescue, she was conscious and was able to close and open her eyes following the instructions of medical teams, a rescuer told AFP. In tears, her uncle embraced one by one the volunteers who rescued her from the rubble.
"We were so happy. Seeing the joy of the family is second to none," said Ismail, a rescue worker. Composed largely of miners from different cities of the country, volunteers are still working to try to find survivors in the ruins. "All miners will tell you the same thing. We came here hoping to locate a sound from a survivor," said Ali Akdogan, a miner. "Even if the sound we locate is that of a cat, we will also try to save it."
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