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CNN Live Today

At Least 85 People Killed in Turkey Earthquake

Aired May 01, 2003 - 10:43   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Right now we want to go back -- stay in the region, but go back to a story we talked about moments ago. That is that earthquake that struck this morning overnight in Bingol, Turkey. We are seeing here this massive effort to try to rescue some students who have been trapped in the rubble of a school and dormitory building that has basically pancaked. The last report we had gotten was this building may have been as many as three or stories high, but now appears it's barely about 10 or 15 feet high.
Joining us now on the phone with more information on this Gokhan Eren, who joined us a while ago to give us an update on what was happening.

Gokhan, what can you tell us is happening right now?

GOKHAN EREN, JOURNALIST: I just see another body being brought down. I have spoken to some of the rescue workers. They do also confirm the number that I've given you earlier, about seven bodies having been recovered here.

But since my latest report, there has been two more bodies recovered and sent away from the school. So for now, nine bodies, one of them belonging to a teacher, and eight students.

HARRIS: Gokhan, let me cut you off real quickly. Are you including the body that we're seeing right now being taken out?

EREN: Yes, exactly, exactly, and the rescue workers are saying that they have detected -- they have not been able to reach yet, but they have seen a total of six bodies so far inside the school that they're trying to recover at the moment.

This information is actually being seen by the fact that the number of body bags that have been sent to the rubble of the school has increased in the past few minutes. Everybody was expecting to have live students being brought out, which has happened in the past six, seven hours, but now it seems like that the chances of live students being brought out is slowly been diminishing.

At the moment, rescue workers are continuing to do their work. You will see that most of them are wearing orange clothing. This actually shows an improvement essentially since the big earthquake in 17 August, 1999.

At that time, not as many rescue operation groups, teams were operating in the country. Now you're seeing both civilian and military rescue workers. But one bad thing is that, again, this earthquake has struck mainly and affected mainly government-made buildings, government-owned buildings, like the school and most other buildings, also in the earthquake before.

HARRIS: Gokhan, can you give us another idea of how many have been rescued totally?

EREN: Could you say again, please?

HARRIS: I understand, it's rather hectic out there. Let me ask you once again -- any further update on how many total have been rescued?

EREN: How many students have been rescued, is that correct?

HARRIS: Yes, rescued alive.

EREN: Rescued alive. Actually, the number has not changed since our last update. A total of 106 people have been rescued from the school -- 104 of these live rescued people were students, and two of them were teachers. A total of 199 students were here before the earthquake at this boarding school, and a total of three teachers were sleeping here at this boarding school. The total amount of people...

HARRIS: Thank you, Gokhan. We're going to have to move on right now.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired May 1, 2003 - 10:43   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Right now we want to go back -- stay in the region, but go back to a story we talked about moments ago. That is that earthquake that struck this morning overnight in Bingol, Turkey. We are seeing here this massive effort to try to rescue some students who have been trapped in the rubble of a school and dormitory building that has basically pancaked. The last report we had gotten was this building may have been as many as three or stories high, but now appears it's barely about 10 or 15 feet high.
Joining us now on the phone with more information on this Gokhan Eren, who joined us a while ago to give us an update on what was happening.

Gokhan, what can you tell us is happening right now?

GOKHAN EREN, JOURNALIST: I just see another body being brought down. I have spoken to some of the rescue workers. They do also confirm the number that I've given you earlier, about seven bodies having been recovered here.

But since my latest report, there has been two more bodies recovered and sent away from the school. So for now, nine bodies, one of them belonging to a teacher, and eight students.

HARRIS: Gokhan, let me cut you off real quickly. Are you including the body that we're seeing right now being taken out?

EREN: Yes, exactly, exactly, and the rescue workers are saying that they have detected -- they have not been able to reach yet, but they have seen a total of six bodies so far inside the school that they're trying to recover at the moment.

This information is actually being seen by the fact that the number of body bags that have been sent to the rubble of the school has increased in the past few minutes. Everybody was expecting to have live students being brought out, which has happened in the past six, seven hours, but now it seems like that the chances of live students being brought out is slowly been diminishing.

At the moment, rescue workers are continuing to do their work. You will see that most of them are wearing orange clothing. This actually shows an improvement essentially since the big earthquake in 17 August, 1999.

At that time, not as many rescue operation groups, teams were operating in the country. Now you're seeing both civilian and military rescue workers. But one bad thing is that, again, this earthquake has struck mainly and affected mainly government-made buildings, government-owned buildings, like the school and most other buildings, also in the earthquake before.

HARRIS: Gokhan, can you give us another idea of how many have been rescued totally?

EREN: Could you say again, please?

HARRIS: I understand, it's rather hectic out there. Let me ask you once again -- any further update on how many total have been rescued?

EREN: How many students have been rescued, is that correct?

HARRIS: Yes, rescued alive.

EREN: Rescued alive. Actually, the number has not changed since our last update. A total of 106 people have been rescued from the school -- 104 of these live rescued people were students, and two of them were teachers. A total of 199 students were here before the earthquake at this boarding school, and a total of three teachers were sleeping here at this boarding school. The total amount of people...

HARRIS: Thank you, Gokhan. We're going to have to move on right now.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com