In first person: Turkey's earthquake, 60 seconds of terror
When devastating earthquakes struck Turkey and Syria on Monday, killing thousands of people, Olga Borzenkova, spokesperson for the UN migration agency (IOM), was in Gaziantep, one of the worst-affected areas in the former country. Borzenkova describes for UN News her experience and the emergency response that is underway.
"Like hundreds of thousands of people in southeastern Turkey, I was sleeping soundly when the world began to shake. I don't know how to describe it to someone who hasn't felt an earthquake, let alone one of the biggest ever recorded in this region.
It is completely surreal. The floor and walls were shaking, buckling, and as we ran down the three floors to the street our only thought was to get far, far away from the buildings.
It was sixty seconds of the worst terror I have ever felt. When we calmed down a bit and realised that we had survived the tremor, we also realised that it was raining, we were cold and our legs felt like jelly, as if they were not part of our bodies. Everyone around us was screaming.
It took us a while, but after the urgency of the second earthquake we finally found a place to take shelter, in a school. Along with hundreds of others, we sat, lay or stood on the basketball court to let our families know we were safe.
Then I caught up on work and began to assess how I could help, how I could tell them what was happening, how I could pay tribute to the wonderful people who were doing all they could to help me and thousands like me.
We spent Monday night in a government-run shelter. We felt some shivering, but it was comfortable and we had hot drinks and some food, as well as a place to sleep. I am now in the office, catching up on everything, including the heartbreaking news that we have lost a colleague. Others are injured and have lost family members and, in some cases, their homes. Others, like a member of my team, miraculously survived in Hatay.
It is an indescribable sadness. One minute we were sleeping, and the next we were part of one of the biggest catastrophes on the planet.
I cry out inside, in despair, grief and fear. But I look at my colleagues, my neighbours and my friends, who are much more affected than I am, and they inspire me to carry on.
Turkey is, of course, very prone to earthquakes and has created a first-class response mechanism. We have been working with them for over 30 years and they are phenomenal partners. But even they will be stretched by this situation. More than a million people who fled the war in Syria have temporary protected status in the area most affected by the earthquake.
We are talking to the government to see how best to help. In all situations like this, the first thing to do is search and rescue, and I know that teams are arriving in the country from all over the world to help.
Of course, there will be huge shelter needs: thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people will be homeless and the weather is freezing. They will need a place to sleep for the short term. They will need warm clothes, water, food, heating, trauma and crush injuries, and huge mental scars.
Communities will have been devastated: schools and hospitals will have been damaged, workplaces will have disappeared. The logistics of relief will be diabolical: roads and airstrips will have to be repaired quickly. It will be a huge rescue, response and recovery operation, and we are prepared to respond in whatever way the government asks us to, for however long it takes.
