Rescue workers searched eight buildings in the town of Izmir when they found the three-year-old. She had been trapped inside the building since Friday.
Rescue worker Nusret Aksoy said he heard a child shouting. After a long time, they managed to find the girl hidden behind a washing machine.
According to the newspaper Nationality the girl must have shouted: “I’m here.”
Aksoy says Ayda Gezgin waved to him, told her her name and that she was fine. She held the hand of the rescue worker while they worked hard to free her.
The three-year-old was covered in dust when she was helped out. According to Reuters, her father gave her a hug when she was finally out.
According to Turkish media, Ayda must be in good shape.
Photo: AP
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Saved by the washing machine
– She smiled. She had been waiting for us, said Levent Onur, who was one of the rescue workers who pulled the three-year-old out of the ruins.
Both Ayda’s father Uğur Gezgin and her older brother followed the nerve-wracking rescue work.
They were, according to the newspaper spokesman outside when the earthquake hit. Ayda and her mother, on the other hand, were trapped inside the ruins. Mora was found dead in the ruins an hour after her daughter was found alive.
THIRST AND HUNGRY: Inside the ambulance, rescue workers ask Ayda Gezgin if she wants something. The three-year-old asks for Turkish meatballs and the yoghurt drink Ayran. Ayda has been locked up in a break-in building for four days.
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According to the rescue workers, the washing machine the three-year-old was locked in the back acted as a shield, so that she was not injured when the house collapsed over her, writes Reuters.
According to the newspaper Sabah a doctor confirms that the three-year-old’s general health is good and that she has no internal bleeding.
According to AFP, the three-year-old is said to have asked for her parents, and asked for meatballs and the yoghurt drink Ayran after she was dug out.
Gezgin was wrapped in warm blankets and taken away in an ambulance while the spectators clapped, cheered, cried and hugged each other, according to the news agency AP.
– A miracle
– We are witnessing a miracle in the 91st hour, wrote the mayor of Izmir Tunc Soyer on Twitter.
On Monday, Turkish crews also rescued a three-year-old and a 14-year-old girl from two destroyed apartment blocks in the Turkish city of Bayrakli.
The discovery of survivors gives new hope to rescue workers to find more people alive. They continued the search immediately on the spot, according to Reuters.
102 people have so far lost their lives in the powerful earthquake on Friday. A thousand people must be injured. 147 are hospitalized. The condition of three of them is critical.
The epicenter was reported below the Aegean Sea. According to the US Geological Survey, it had a strength of 7.0. Turkish agencies measured the quake at a slightly lower intensity.
Two people were killed and 19 were injured on the Greek island of Samos.
In an earlier version, the mayor of Izmir stated that the girl was four years old. Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca later said she was three years old.
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