Turkey earthquake survivors sleep in containers and open air

Residents near Sindirgi epicentre search for people trapped in rubble

A football stadium in Sindirgi, Turkey, was used to put up some local residents overnight after a 6.1-magnitude earthquake killed one person and destroyed 16 buildings. AP

An earthquake in Turkey has left people sleeping in containers and the open air after more than a dozen buildings were destroyed in the 6.1-magnitude tremor.

Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said Turkey’s disaster management authority was sending containers to villages where a total of 16 buildings had been destroyed. “We are at their [citizens’] service until they return to their permanent homes,” he said in a press conference in Balikesir, near the epicentre.

Some Sindirgi residents rested outdoors after the earthquake. AP

People were searching for survivors in the rubble in the town of Sindirgi on Monday. Some locals spent the night in a local football stadium with blankets and bottles of water, while others rested on outdoor mats.

One person was killed and 29 were injured in Sunday's quake, during which tremors were felt in Istanbul and across several provinces. Aftershocks ranging between magnitude 3.4 and 4.6 were felt in the area, geologists reported.

Rubble from the earthquake destroyed a car in Sindirgi. AP

Container cities were set up in Turkey after a 7.8-magnitude earthquake in 2023 killed at least 53,000 people and devastated the city of Antakya. Another 6,000 people were killed in the northern parts of neighbouring Syria.

After Sunday's quake the Interior Ministry has allocated 20 million Turkish lira ($490,000) in emergency funds to the disaster management authority, known as AFAD, to help recovery efforts, Mr Yerlikaya added.

People were sleeping outdoors as Turkey's government promised to provide containers. AP

Two people were arrested on charges of causing death and injury by negligence following the collapse in the quake of a three-storey building in the town of Sindirgi, which killed one person.

The two suspects were the contractor who built the property, and its owner, Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc said.

A drone view shows one of the collapsed buildings in Turkey's Balikesir province. Reuters