The Earthquakes in Türkiye and Syria: One Year Later
At 4:17 A.M. on February 6, 2023, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck southern Türkiye, followed by thousands of powerful aftershocks — including one which registered a magnitude of 7.5. It impacted millions of people in Türkiye and neighboring Syria, and it was even felt as far away as Egypt. One year later, we reflect on the devastation of this event and the work USAID did to save lives.
“If something big happens, we know that we’ll get called to respond.”
– USAID Türkiye and Syria Earthquake Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) Lead Stephen Allen
Though it’s been a year, the impacts from the catastrophic earthquakes in Türkiye and Syria — the most powerful to hit the region in nearly a century — are still being felt today. The disaster killed 50,000 people and affected roughly 14 million more across the region. In Syria alone, more than 500,000 people were displaced, exacerbating the already grave humanitarian situation following over 10 years of conflict in the country.
Amid the unspeakable tragedy, the disaster experts from USAID’s Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance (BHA) moved quickly and decisively — calling on all areas of the organization, its staff, its partners, and other U.S. government agencies — to put their unique skills to use and save lives.
Here are some of the ways in which USAID supported the people of Türkiye and Syria in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy, as well as in the year since.
Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) Activated
In the hours after news of the earthquakes in Türkiye and Syria first broke, USAID leapt to action. BHA, as the U.S. government’s lead coordinator for disaster response, immediately deployed a DART to Türkiye — the elite group of staff whose experience and skill set enables them to be the eyes, ears, and hands on the ground, ensuring humanitarian aid gets to where it needs to go. Additionally, we stood up a Washington D.C.-based Response Management Team, the nerve center of the response, to provide support for the DART and coordinate our strategy and programs from the nation’s capital.
In the following days and weeks, the DART would grow to include more than 200 staff, making it one of USAID’s largest disaster deployments in recent history.
But getting that many people into the heart of a region decimated by violent earthquakes was no small challenge. “It should take maybe 3 hours normally,” DART Lead Stephen Allen said about the journey from the Turkish city of Adana up into the mountains of Adiyaman, where the team would do much of its on-the-ground work. “It took us almost 12 hours to get there because the roads were not passable.”
Once in Adiyaman, the scenes were surreal, not only due to the destruction, itself, but also due to how random it seemed. “When we first drove in, I wasn’t totally convinced that we were in the right spot because the edge of the town looked okay.” Allen recalled. “But when we went into the town itself, it became clear very quickly that the extent of devastation in Adiyaman was enormous.”
Prior to serving in Türkiye, Allen’s experience had largely been in responding to conflicts rather than natural disasters. But even through that lens, the damage in Türkiye was overwhelming to take in.
“When you go into a post-conflict setting or an active conflict setting, it’s not uncommon to see a building that’s been destroyed or damage to several buildings,” he said. “But this was as if every building in the downtown area had been hit by an airstrike. Every single one.”
Urban Search and Rescue Experts from Both Sides of the U.S.
The very first and most important task was to search for signs of life from people trapped alive under and amid the extensive damage. To help this rescue effort, USAID called upon its elite team of urban search and rescue (USAR) experts. These individuals, based out of the fire departments of Fairfax County, Virginia, and Los Angeles County, California, packed their bags and traveled halfway across the world with little warning. “BHA has drilled for this,” Allen noted. “They’ve set up protocols. They’ve practiced. They had experience doing it.”
Of the over 200 staff comprising the DART, 164 people were urban search-and-rescue team members, along with 12 canines and 170,000+ pounds of specialized equipment designed specifically to aid in circumstances such as this one. “We don’t want to be a burden on the community,” said John Morrison of Fairfax County’s USAR team. “So we bring everything we need, including food, water, shelter, power, all the rescue equipment, all the medical equipment.”
From their activation on February 7 to their demobilization on February 20, the USAR team performed rescue operations and assessed structural damage at over 6,000 buildings in the area.
The teams worked in shifts around the clock using tools such as saws, drills, torches and hydraulic concrete breaking equipment. “We were still helping pull survivors from rubble,” said L.A. County USAR’s Dylan Laurino when asked about what fueled him through grueling shifts days after their arrival. “We know there is hope because we see it.”
Sure enough, in the overnight hours of February 11 — five days after the earthquake first struck — USAID’s USAR teams assisted Turkish responders in rescuing someone who’d managed to survive all that time trapped under the rubble:
Support from the U.S. Military
USAID’s ability to call on the unique capabilities of the Department of Defense to provide transportation and logistics was critical in these first days, where every second counted.
In Türkiye, U.S. European Command (EUCOM) helicopters supported the USAID-led response by transporting DART personnel and equipment to disaster sites and enabled our disaster experts to conduct damage assessments from the sky to better allocate resources in real time. Additionally, EUCOM delivered nearly 600,000 pounds of emergency relief items to earthquake-affected areas.
Assistance Across the Border in Syria
Though our teams were not able to get on the ground in Syria due to the ongoing conflict, USAID scaled up its support for partner organizations already working in the affected areas — totaling approximately $73 million specifically targeted to help the response to the earthquakes.
One local organization, the White Helmets, took on the responsibility of search-and-rescue operations itself. “The White Helmets have developed one of the only at-scale search and rescue civil defense efforts in northwest Syria,” Allen explained. “The earthquake created an opportunity for us to partner with them in a way that we had not done as BHA before.” In addition to funding, USAID was able to provide specialized equipment and tools.
Beyond search and rescue, USAID’s ongoing humanitarian programs inside Syria enabled trusted partners like the World Food Program and the International Organization for Migration to pivot and deliver assistance to regions most impacted by the earthquake. This aid–arriving in the form of food assistance, shelter support, water, sanitation, and hygiene services–was just one piece of the larger USAID response to ongoing needs of the Syrian people.
USAID’s Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance in 2023 and Beyond
In the year since the earthquakes, USAID has provided more than $242 million in humanitarian assistance to support partners delivering emergency food, health, shelter, water and sanitation, and other life-saving assistance in Türkiye and Syria.
In Türkiye, our partners — including the World Health Organization and non-governmental organizations such as Relief International and Samaritan’s Purse — continue to provide critical health assistance to affected populations. Partners like UNICEF are helping ensure hygiene supplies and safe drinking water continue to reach affected communities.
In Syria, USAID’s support continues to reach roughly 3 million people per month, helping those impacted by both conflict and the earthquakes.
The historic scale and magnitude of the devastation in Türkiye and Syria called for a significant and robust humanitarian response. One year later, our thoughts remain with those whose lives continue to be impacted by this disaster, including our local partners–many of whom suffered staggering personal losses.
“I had friends and family who were directly affected by the earthquake. While dealing with that, our team turned around and started responding — whether that was officially as part of what we were doing, or in some cases, literally just helping our neighbors and family and friends in their environment,” Allen said. “And that, to me, speaks to the dedication and resiliency of our team.”
While our teams are no longer on the ground, our work to support the people of Türkiye and Syria has not ended.
