Death toll rises to 20 as body of child reached

ADIYAMAN / ŞANLIURFA

Death toll rises to 20 in the flood disaster that hit the southern provinces, as the body of a child who went missing was found hours after the body of her mother was reached on March 20.

During the heavy rain that started late March 14 in the Adıyaman’s Tut district that was also devastated by the Feb. 6 earthquakes, Ömerovası Stream overflowed.

The container which Tekdal and Sarıkaya families set up in a garden near the stream was caught in the flood waters.

While eight people in the container rescued themselves, the lifeless bodies of Selma Sarıkaya and Emine Sarıkaya were later found.

Nurse Fatma Tekdal, who was in the second month of her pregnancy, and her one-and-a half-year-old daughter Zeynep Zümre were also caught in flood waters in Adıyaman.

The lifeless bodies of the mother and daughter that the teams have been searching for for six days were reached on March 20.

The body of the mother was found near the Boydere village, eight kilometers away from where she was last seen.

The search teams found the body of the girl in a hydroelectric dam near the village of the Boydere.

Since reaching the lifeless body of the girl, the number of people who lost their lives due to the floods in Şanlurfa and Adıyaman increased to 20.

Search and rescue teams are carrying out works to find truck driver Emin Ergün in Şanlıurfa.

Some 90 personnel and two helicopters participated in search efforts near the Yalıntaş neighborhood where Ergün was last seen.

In the southeastern province of Mardin, another city affected by heavy rains, 11-year-old Fatma Sezer lost her balance and fell into the Cırcıp Stream as the water flow increased due to the torrential rains.

Upon receiving notifications, teams immediately started a search and rescue operation for the girl, and the efforts are ongoing.

However, Sezer could not be reached during the three-day work of the teams.

The teams throw light on the possibility that Sezer might have drifted to Syria through the stream.

It also learned that the 11-year-old girl fell into the stream while trying to rescue her cousin who slipped due to the mud.

“Her uncle’s daughter slipped in the mud. When Fatma went to help her, she also slipped. The cousin managed to get out by holding on to something nearby, but Fatma disappeared,” explained Rıdvan Sezer, Fatma’s uncle.

Cleaning work has also been completed in the Abide Junction underpass, where nine people lost their lives as the six-meter-high underpass filled with flood waters in the province of Şanlıurfa. The underpass was reopened to traffic.

Approximately 10,000 personnel, about 2,000 of them soldiers, are carrying out cleaning works in the city with more than 1,600 vehicles.

In the city, damage assessment studies are also ongoing, while it was determined that 3,154 people whose houses, workplaces and household goods were severely damaged have been affected by the floods.