how some survivors were able to last five days under the rubble

Five days after the earthquake, in Antioch (Turkey), rescuers still hope to find survivors under the rubble. A seven-year-old child was saved on Saturday February 11, as were his two older sisters and his mother. All are injured, but alive. In Kahramanmaraş (Turkey), the epicenter of the earthquake, a rescue of a 16-year-old teenager was rescued after waiting 119 hours without moving.

Being able to hydrate

According to doctors, there is little chance of follow-up beyond 72 hours, unless you have oxygen and you can hydrate yourself. “People who manage to get by are people who manage to find water points, if only by moistened tissues that they can suck“, says doctor-colonel Norbert Berginiat, vice-president of the national federation of firefighters of France. Paradoxically, it is sometimes the elderly who last the longest. An 85-year-old woman has just been rescued. “The metabolism is less active, it consumes less oxygen, less protein“, notes Pr. Frédéric Adnet, head of the emergency department at Avicenne Hospital (AP-HP).