Rescue work in Turkey continues due to the earthquake that has caused 39 deaths

Rescue efforts continue to save two people trapped under the rubble after the 6.8 magnitude earthquake that hit eastern Turkey last Friday and caused 39 fatalities.

Some 45 people have been rescued alive after the earthquake and now the latest rescue efforts are concentrated in a house in the peripheral neighborhood of the city of Elazig, in the southeast of Anatolia, where two people remain trapped.

The tremor, with an epicenter in a rural area in the province of Elazig, has affected some 1,600 people, who went to hospitals in the area, although only a hundred are still in treatment.

In the next few hours, authorities are expected to remove debris from the 87 buildings that have collapsed and another 1,200 that were severely damaged by the earthquake.

Since the quake, more than 800 aftershocks have already been recorded, twenty of them above the magnitude of 4, but apparently without causing further damage.

Elazig province is located at the junction of two important geological faults that make Turkey a country with very frequent earthquakes, although earthquakes below magnitude 6, very common also in western Anatolia, do not usually cause casualties and normally only cause minor damage.