The devastating earthquake on the 6th of February 2023 in ten cities in the South-Eastern Region of Turkey has led to countless lives being lost, tens of thousands wounded and entire cities turned into ghost towns. The recovery will take years.
The mobilisation of citizens all over the country is exemplary. Civil society has reacted immediately through NGOs, community centers and local associations to rush aid to the region. One of these organisations is most praiseworthy:
We began to work with our team and volunteers in the early hours of the 6th of February. Here is what we have been able to do up to now:
- We contacted more than 2000 people throughout the day to invite them to become volunteers.
- Nearly 500 volunteers in the warehouses :Hatay Antakya Expo, Maraş Pazarcık and Adıyaman where longhaul aid trucks have arrived, are now active in sorting out and packaging the aid in kind.
- The totality of the on site necessity demands from Hatay is being met with volunteer motorcycle courier team. The volunteers of the Disaster Platform are distributing the aid packages to the survivors in need who have been verified as such.
- Nearly 100 volunteers in the warehouse of the Gaziantep Middle-East Fair Center, in the Gaziantep Red Crescent warehouse and in Istanbul have provided support to the work being carried out by the municipalities and the TOG Office.
- WE got a donation of fuel support. We dispatched a rented long haul truck to Hatay with 12 generator-oil containers and 270 litres of fuel oil.
- We had 6 generators, generator oil and heaters sent to Adıyaman and Maraş.
- We dispatched and continue to dispatch 170 thermal tents , hundreds of eau de cologne, coats, thermal socks, power banks, camping beds, reflector vests, masks, hygiene kit, boots, heater.
- Alongside the work carried out in warehouses, an on-site inventory of needs in Hatay is being carried out. 10 vehicles have already been dispatched.
- 12 mobile WC’s in 3 Containers were sent to Hatay. Two of the containers have 6 WC’s and 3 sinks, one has 4 WC’s, two bathtubs and three sinks.
And the list goes on and on. The volunteers’ work in the field is relentless and they are doing everything they can to dispatch the aid material constantly flowing in from all over the country to wherever it is most needed.
For more information and if you’d like to contribute to our cause, please contact Gökçe from our team: [email protected]
With solidarity,
TOG Family