A newborn baby was rescued from a fallen building in northern Syria after relatives found her underneath the rubble with her umbilical cord intact. She was still tied to her mother, who died in the massive earthquake on Monday, February 6.
The baby was the only surviving member of the immediate family, with the rest having been killed when the earthquake hit Syria and Turkey, flattening the family’s home in the town of Jindayris
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Khalil Al-Suwadi, one of the baby’s relatives, told reporters they heard a noise while digging. After clearing the dust, they finally found the baby still attached to her mother through the umbilical cord, and one of the relatives took her to a nearby hospital that was still functioning.
The video of the child getting pulled out of the rubble quickly went viral on social media. The video shows a man running out of the rubble of the collapsed building clutching the tiny infant covered in dust.
Another man ran to them with a blanket to cover the baby and warm her in the freezing temperatures, while another man screamed for transport to take the baby to the hospital.
Relatives rushed the baby to a hospital in a town near the home while other relatives recovered the bodies of her family, including her father and mother, four siblings, and their aunt.
They kept the bodies on the floor of another relative’s home before conducting a joint funeral on Tuesday, February 8.
The newborn is among thousands of families who lost their loved ones and homes in Syria and Turkey following the 7.8 magnitude earthquake that brought unimaginable devastation.
According to Syrian officials, over 3,000 people have died, while Turkish officials confirmed that more than 12,000 people died in the earthquakes and aftershocks. That brings the combined death toll to over 15,000 people.
That number is expected to rise, with experts predicting it to even double as evacuations and rescues are still underway in hundreds of collapsed building across the two nations. The collapsed buildings trapped many people who were still asleep when the first earthquake hit in the early morning.
Survivors in Turkey and Syria are spending their nights in the cold as many take refuge in their cars or the streets because they fear going back into buildings that the quakes may have seriously weakened.
Many countries worldwide have pledged to help the affected nations. The EU confirmed on Wednesday, February 8, that it would send about $3.7 million to Syria and $3.6 million to Turkey to help rescue efforts.