Rubble of destroyed building in Antakya, Turkey. (Credit: Mohammed Yassin/L'Orient Today)
ANKARA — The owner of Sila, a 2-1/2-year-old Doberman, was surprised to see not one but four dogs emerge from the rubble of a building in Turkey's southern province of Hatay, 28 days after earthquakes devastated the region.
Kadir Keyifli said he had asked local rescue teams for help getting his dog out of the rubble but nobody had been able to enter the wreckage.
Meyako, a regional animal rescue team, came to his aid on Monday. After hours of work, they managed to reach the basement where Sila was trapped — and saw that she had not only survived for nearly a month but also given birth to three puppies.
"What did you drink here? What did you eat? Did you give birth to three of them?" one rescue worker asks in a video of the moment they reached Sila.
The workers were seen going through a narrow opening among the rubble and then breaking open a hole in a door to access the room in the basement, which appeared to have sustained little damage.
"My dogs are coming out after one month. Thank God," exclaims Keyifli in the video shared by Meyako. Keyifli said Sila survived and gave birth thanks to a large bag of dog food that was left in the basement.
Sila and her pups were taken to the nearby city of Adana for treatment. Rescuers noted the mother looked skinny, but apart from that was walking unaided.
The death toll in Turkey and Syria from last month's earthquakes has neared 52,000.