Thirteen people drown on same day in waters around Turkey

ISTANBUL

DHA Photo

A total of 13 people drowned in Turkey Aug. 11, the Sunday right after the Eid-al Fitr holiday, while six of the incidents happened in Istanbul.

Thirteen people drowned in Turkey’s various seas and lakes in cities including Istanbul and Ankara on Aug. 11.

Istanbul Gov. Avni Mutlu posted on Twitter that six people had drowned on Istanbul’s Black Sea coast on the same day.

“Unfortunately, six of our citizens have passed away in drowning incidents that all occurred in the Black Sea. We give our condolences to the families,” read Mutlu’s tweet.

Another seven people drowned in Adana, Ankara, Şanlıurfa, Zonguldak, Bursa and Tekirdağ Aug. 11, adding up to 13 drowning incidents.

Meanwhile, 20 people drowned around the country during the three-day Eid-al Fitr holiday. One of those drowned was university student Emrah Ukşal, who had scored the highest rank in Tekirdağ’s Çerkezköy district in the university entrance exams last year. Ukşal was an undergraduate student at Istanbul’s Galatasaray University, majoring in communications.

Earlier last week in Turkey’s eastern province Batman, search and rescue teams discovered the bodies of seven Syrian refugees in an automobile in the creek while they were searching for the body of Civan Roj Ergun, who went missing while fishing. Ergun’s body was also found.