THE TWIN QUAKES
The stories behind the seismic activity that shook Turkey and Syria in February 2023
SEE THE STORY"THERE IS NOTHING LEFT."
On February 6, 2023, two earthquakes struck southeast Turkey and northwest Syria in the space of hours. The first measured 7.8. More than 50,000 people were killed. Twenty million were affected. Entire cities were erased.
Outriders deployed a team of journalists within days. Over two weeks, they reported from nine Turkish cities and three Syrian locations - moving between two countries, two political contexts, and the same fundamental human fact: people who had already lost everything, losing everything again.
"Here life ended. Nothing is left."Words heard repeatedly by Outriders journalists in the fieldTURKEY AND SYRIA · FEBRUARY 2023
TURKEY - 9 CITIES
Hatay, Gaziantep, Adiyaman, Kahramanmaras, Kilis, Osmaniye, Adana. Some cities lost almost their entire urban core. Others lost hundreds of residents with the collapse of a single building. Nurdagi and Islahiye were effectively wiped from the map. The port of Iskenderun burned for days. Antakya - one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world - was largely destroyed.
GAZIANTEP
Near the epicentre. Historic bazaar district destroyed.
ISKENDERUN
The port burned. The hospital was evacuated.
KAHRAMANMARAS
The epicentre province. Ottoman heritage reduced to rubble.
NURDAGI
Near total destruction. Over 100,000 people displaced.
OSMANIYE
Hundreds killed with the collapse of residential buildings.
Antakya, Hatay · Photo: Diego Cupolo
SYRIA - EARTHQUAKE IN A WAR ZONE
Northwest Syria had already endured twelve years of civil war when the earthquake struck. For many families in Jindires, Afrin, and Idlib, this was the second, third, or fourth displacement. Aid could not enter without UN Security Council approval - including Russian assent. The White Helmets worked with a single excavator.
"Why are our lives worth less than those in Turkey?"
Jindires, Syria · Photo: Abbie Cheeseman
Idlib, Syria · Drone: Mohamad Daboul
Drone footage from four locations - Hatay, Dogansehir, and Kahramanmaras in Turkey; Idlib in Syria - captures what ground-level photography cannot: the full geometry of absence. The drone reveals what was there before by the shape of what is gone.
HATAY, TURKEY · TOM NICHOLSON
DOGANSEHIR, TURKEY · TOM NICHOLSON
KAHRAMANMARAS, TURKEY · PEPIGIN NAGTZAAM
IDLIB, SYRIA · MOHAMAD DABOUL
Aerial documentation · Turkey and Syria · February 2023
Interactive article · Mobile view
"For some, it was the second or third time they had to rebuild their lives from nothing."THE TWIN QUAKES · OUTRIDERS · 2023