Press Centre 2003/05/04: Emergencies and Disasters

UNICEF Turkey launches flash appeal for US$450,000 to aid recovery from earthquake in Eastern Turkey

Under-funding will seriously hinder UNICEF’s ability to respond to the urgent humanitarian assistance needs of the most vulnerable children and women in the earthquake area

Ankara, 4th May, 2003 -- An earthquake measuring 6.4 on the Richter Scale (RS) struck at 3.20am on the 1st of May 2003 in the province of Bingöl in Eastern Turkey. A quarter of a million people are estimated to live in the area. This is the second earthquake of this magnitude to strike Bingöl in thirty-two years. The shock was felt in five other cities and more than seventy aftershocks were recorded within a few hours. Electricity was cut and most people spent the night on the street in fear that their homes were on the verge of collapse. In the first hours of the crisis, the Ministry of Health (MOH) had mobile rescue teams and ambulances on-site to deal with the casualties.

As of the 5th of May, 177 were reported killed and 520 injured. The worst hit was the boarding school in Çeltiksuyu, fifteen kilometres east of the city of Bingöl, where 85 students and one teacher died and 115 were rescued.

Thirteen search and rescue teams worked relentlessly around the clock following the building’s collapse in the hope of finding more children alive. The last child was rescued aliveat 9.30am on the 3rd of May. The search and rescue operation was completed on the following day when the last bodies were retrieved.

The collapse of Çeltiksuyu school, built in 1998, echoes the damage caused by previous earthquakes in Turkey. The disaster suggests that public buildings are not constructed according to safety specifications -- a disturbing fact considering that there are 247 such boarding schools in Turkey. Of these, the majority are in East and Southeast Anatolia, catering for over 130,000 students, 25% of whom are girls. School buildings tend to be damaged most by earthquakes in Turkey: following the Marmara earthquake of 1999, 131 schools collapsed.

Geophysics experts assert that 70% of the buildings in İstanbul are constructed illegally.

The Governor’s office and the Turkish Red Crescent (Kızılay) are carrying out a damage assessment throughout the province of Bingöl. Initial reports confirm that schools are the worst hit. Apart from Çeltiksuyu boarding school, three more school buildings have totally collapsed and scores of others were damaged beyond use.

UNICEF Rapid Assessment

UNICEF Turkey is in a strong position to respond rapidly to the disaster because of preparedness measures already in place to meet the crisis in Iraq.

The UNICEF Psychosocial Coordinator reached Bingöl within fifteen hours in order to conduct a rapid assessment and was followed soon after by the UNICEF Representative and two UNICEF Programme Officers to assist with the assessment. On-site meetings were held with the Governor, the Turkish Red Crescent (Kızılay) and officials from the health, education and social welfare departments of the Governorate.

Ninety emergency health kits provided by UNICEF to the MoH were delivered to Bingöl in the early hours following the initial shock. Each emergency pack contains enough basic emergency supplies and essential drugs to last a thousand people up to three months -- enough to service 90,000 people for three months. Contingency supplies from UNICEF depots in Turkey will be sent to the affected areas during the week commencing 5th of May.

UNICEF assistance in the wake of the disaster will focus on education and psychosocial measures. The essential objective is to expedite recovery of children and their families.

Edmond McLoughney, UNICEF Country Representative in Turkey says:

The importance of schooling in a crisis situation such as this can’t be under-estimated. The daily routine of study distracts children from their immediate sufferings. The concentration required for study allows the psyche space to relax and breathe during school hours. School becomes a refuge of stability in a world shrouded by hundreds of uncertainties. This constant point of reference is vital for the child to cling to in the absence of other reassuring realities.

Education

The Governor’s office and local officials strongly feel that it is crucial to get children back to school as quickly as possible. As teachers repair their own homes and organise themselves in the next weeks, UNICEF will deliver a hundred tents to Bingöl in time for the re-opening of schools on the 12th of May. Ninety-seven tents will be allocated for schools and the remaining three will be used by the Social Services and Child Protection Agency (SHÇEK) to provide day care services for pre-school children. Priority will of course be given to the worst affected areas.

Additional emergency supplies pre-positioned for the potential influx of Iraqi refugees to Turkey will also be delivered to Bingöl during the course of this week since tents and ‘school-in-a-box’ kits are required to meet the immediate needs of temporary schools in the area. These supplies include:

• fifty school-in-a-box kits;
• fifty primary school recreation kits;
• fifty psycho-social support kits;
• forty pre-school recreation kits.

The UNICEF tents and supplies will help to ensure the continuation of children’s education from the first days. Besides ensuring the basic right to education, the initiative will help to re-establish a sense of normalcy -- an important step towards complete recovery from traumatic experiences of this kind.

In the medium term, the education intervention will have to address the needs of children attending schools in the area. Boarding schools are quite common in the Eastern provinces since they are part of the government’s strategy to deal with rural education. Small village schools have been closed because they are uneconomical and the children are either sent to larger schools or to boarding schools at the expense of the State.

Most pupils come from poor rural families and this disaster may well result in parents taking their children out of such facilities or not sending them to school at all. The broader impact of the earthquake could be considerable, seriously affecting UNICEF’s drive to improve enrolment rates for girls.

Psychosocial Intervention

The assessment shows a clear need to focus on the psychosocial needs of children. A treatment programme for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) should be initiated as soon as possible in order to alleviate serious psychological damage to the affected population. Experience gained by UNICEF following the Marmara earthquakes in 1999 will prove to be an extremely valuable resource in this context.

Following the Marmara earthquakes, UNICEF and Ministry of National Education (MONE) ran a nationwide training programme for school counselors on psycho-social rehabilitation and trauma counselling. UNICEF and MONE will support similar psychosocial activities in the schools of Bingöl.

The intervention will be articulated in phases, on the basis of a consolidated methodology, which foresees:

• the debriefing of teachers and school counselors working in the affected area;
• the implementation of Psycho-education and Group Counselling: parallel approaches designed to provide a comprehensive response to the needs of children and families affected by the tragedy.

Appeal for Funds

An initial amount of US$450,000 is needed in order to respond to the emergency crisis in the most appropriate way and to address the immediate needs of children and women among the affected population:

• Education: US$250,000
• Psycho-social Response: US$120,000
• Programme Support: US$80,000

So far, the sum of €100,000 has been pledged by the UNICEF Italian National Committee which leaves a shortfall of US$350,000.

Following the assessment carried out by UNICEF, the greatest need will be in education since most schools were seriously damaged. Additional funds will be required to furnish an extra two hundred tents for temporary school premises.

Use the ‘Support Us’ link at the foot of this page to make an online tax-free donation to the Turkish National Committee for UNICEF now. Alternatively, you can make a credit transfer through your bank to Türkiye İş Bankası, Çankaya Branch, Ankara, Branch No. 4238, Account No. 500.

You can also help support us by purchasing gifts from the Turkish National Committee for UNICEF E-shop.

For further information, please contact:

Edmond McLoughney
UNICEF Turkey Representative:
+90 (0)312 454 1000

For more about UNICEF Turkey’s Programme on Emergency and Disaster Preparedness, see our Programmes 2001 -- 2005.

Read a report from the scene in the Summer 2003 issue of Say Yes.

Read Less Fearful, More Active -- the story of the MONE/UNICEF Psycho-social School Project following the 1999 earthquakes in the northwestern Marmara region of Turkey.

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