Newborn who still had the cord attached to her dead mother was rescued from rubble in Syria

In the midst of tragedy, stories that can be classified as a miracle always emerge. Among the ruins of a building in Jindires, a town in north-western Syria heavily affected by the quake, Rescue workers found a baby girl, born under the rubble and still attached by the umbilical cord to her deceased mother.

Relatives helped by members of the rescue teams found the bodies of his father, Abdallah Mleihan, his mother, Aafra, his three sisters, his brother and his aunt on Monday.

This girl is the only survivor of a family in which all the members died when their four-story building collapsed in this town near the border with Turkey.

“We were looking for Abu Rudayna (nickname for Abdalá) and his family. First we found his sister, then his wife, then Abu Rudayna, they were together with each other, ”a family relative, Khalil Sawadi, explained to AFP, still in shock.

“Then we heard a noise and we dug (…), we cleaned the place and we found this little girl, praise God,” he says.

The newborn still had the umbilical cord attached to her mother. “We cut it and my cousin took the baby to the hospital,” he continues.

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In a video circulating on social media, a man is seen carrying a naked, dust-coated baby through the rubble, its umbilical cord still dangling.

In the icy cold, another throws a blanket over the creature.

Bad weather conditions in the Anatolian region complicate rescue efforts and darken the prospects for survivors, who warm up in tents or by makeshift bonfires.

He was born after the earthquake

The baby was taken to a hospital in the nearby city of Afrin, where she was placed in an incubator and given vitamins.

“He arrived with his limbs numb from the cold, his blood pressure had dropped. We did first aid on her and put her under infusion because she had gone too long without being fed, ”Doctor Hani Maaruf explains to AFP.

The little girl has bruises, but her condition is stable, according to the doctor. “He was probably born seven hours after the quake,” he adds. She weighs 3,175 kg, so she was born on schedule.precise.

With their few means, it took the rescuers hours to remove the rubble to extract the bodies of the rest of the family.

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They were placed side by side in a relative’s house, covered with sheets, awaiting the funeral.

In the room, Khalil Sawadi lists their names. “We are displaced from Deir Ezzor, Abdullah is my cousin and I am married to his sister,” he says.

The family had fled the volatile Deir Ezzor region further east, believing they would be safe in Jindires, a town controlled since 2018 by Turkish forces and pro-Turkish rebel groups.

Some fifty houses collapsed in this Syrian town, relatively close to the epicenter of the earthquake in Turkey, according to an AFP correspondent.

He earthquake has caused more than 5,000 deaths in Turkey and Syriaaccording to the latest balances, which do not stop increasing.

In addition, the radical drop in temperatures carries an additional risk of hypothermia for the injured and those trapped under the rubble.

On Monday, they registered up 185 aftershocks, in addition to the two main shocks: one of 7.8 in the middle of the night (04H17 local) and the other of magnitude 7.5 at noon.

Aftershocks continued into the early hours of Tuesday. The strongest, of magnitude 5.5, occurred at 6:13 local time (3:13 GMT) 9 km southeast of Gölbasi (southern Turkey).

According to the White Helmets, an emergency service operating in Syrian rebel areas, more than 200 buildings have been left to the ground in this sector.

This group pleaded Tuesday to international organizations to come to the aid of these damaged and forgotten regions. “Time is short. Hundreds of people are trapped in the rubble.” warned. (YO)