UPDATE 2 - Miracles continue as survivors rescued 9 days after quakes in southern Türkiye

UPDATES WITH MORE RESCUES, INTERVIEW WITH RESCUED SURVIVOR; EDITS THROUGHOUT

By Anadolu Staff

HATAY/KAHRAMANMARAS, Türkiye (AA) - Miracles continue as more survivors are pulled alive from the rubble nine days after strong earthquakes hit southern Türkiye.

Two brothers, Baki Yeninar, 21, and Muhammed Enes Yeninar, 17, were rescued in the province of Kahramanmaras, where the quakes were centered, almost 200 hours later.

Baki said he held onto life by drinking protein powder.

Muhammed Cafer Cetin, 18, was also rescued in the Adiyaman province 198 hours after the quakes.

Miner Ilyas Gunes, who rescued Cetin, told Anadolu that they had spoken about things like the plan of the house, where its rooms are, where they slept, and the floor they lived on. They also tried to figure out where everyone might have been when the quake struck.

"We thought maybe they were watching TV in the living room," said Gunes, adding that Cetin later told them that he had been playing a video game.

"While we were scooping the debris under our feet with an excavator, a hole opened over there and suddenly we heard a voice saying 'I'm here'."

The first thing Cetin asked for after being rescued was water and a hot meal, he added.

"We’re very happy right now. This has given us a wonderful, wonderful happiness after seven or eight days, and now all our exhaustion is gone."

A woman was rescued from under the rubble 201 hours after the earthquakes in the Hatay province. Emine Akgul, 26, was saved by miners and other search and rescue teams in the Antakya district.

Muna Dabul, a foreign national, was rescued from under the rubble 204 hours after the earthquakes in Hatay and taken to the hospital.

At least 31,600 people died in the two strong earthquakes that jolted southern Türkiye on Feb. 6. More than 80,000 others were injured.

The magnitude 7.7 and 7.6 quakes, centered in the Kahramanmaras province, affected more than 13 million people across 10 provinces, including Hatay, Gaziantep, Adiyaman, Malatya, Adana, Diyarbakir, Kilis, Osmaniye, and Sanliurfa.

Several countries in the region, including Syria and Lebanon, also felt the strong tremors that struck Türkiye in the space of less than 10 hours.